ON  ^  ^- 


one;  ,    D.  D, 


BX  9931  .M36  v. 5'  * 
Cone,  Orello,  1835-1905 
Salvation 


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4. 


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i^lanuals  of  JFaitlj  ano  ©utp. 

EDITED    BY    REV.    J.    S.    CANTWELL,    D.D. 


A  SERIES  of  short  books  in  exposition  of  prominent  teachings 
of  the  Universalist  Church,  and  the  moral  and  religious 
obligations  of  believers.  They  are  prepared  by  writers  selected  for 
their  ability  to  present  in  brief  compass  an  instructive  and  helpful 
Manual  on  the  subject  undertaken.  The  volumes  will  be  affirmative 
and  constructive  in  statement,  avoiding  controversy,  while  specifically 
unfolding  doctrines. 

The  Manuals  of  Faith  and  Duty  are  issued  at  intervals  of 
three  or  four  months  ;  uniform  in  size,  style,  and  price. 

No.  I.    THE  FATHERHOOD  OF  GOD. 

By  Rev.  J.  Coleman  Adams,  D.D.,  Chicago, 

No.  II.    JESUS  THE  CHRIST. 

By  Rev.  S.  Crane,  D,D  ,  Norwalk,  O, 

No,  III,     REVELATION, 

By   Rev.    I.    M,    Atwood,    D.D.,    President   of    the   Theological 
School,  Canton,   N,  Y, 

No.  IV.     CHRIST  IN  THE  LIFE. 

By  Rev,  Warren  S,  Woodbridge,  Medford,  Mass. 

No.  V.     SALVATION. 

By    Rev.    Orello    Cone,   D.D.,    President   of    Buchtel    College, 
Akron,  O. 

Number  VI.  of  the  Series  will  be :  "  The  Birth  from  Above," 
by  Rev.  Charles  Follen  Lee.  Other  volumes  and  writers  will  be 
announced  hereafter. 


published   by  the 

UNIVERSALIST   PUBLISHING  HOUSE, 

BOSTON,    MASS. 
Western  Branch:  69  Dearborn  Street,  Chicago. 


JHanuals  of  JFait|)  antj  ©utg. 


No.  V. 


-     OCT  13  1920 


SALVATION. 


BY 


ORELLO  ^ONE,    D.D., 

PRESIDENT  OP  BDCHTEL  COLLEGE,  AKRON,  0. 


For  the  law  of  the  spirit  of  life  ix  Christ  Jesus  hath 
made  me  free  from  the  law  of  sin  and  death. 

Komaus  viii.  2. 


BOSTON: 

UNIVERSALIST  PUBLISHING   HOUSE. 

1889. 


Copyright,  1889, 
By  the  Universalist  Publishing  House. 


John  Wilson  &  Son,  Cambridge. 


CONTENTS. 


Section  Page 

Introduction    ...........  5 

I.       SOLVATION   IN   THE    OlD   TESTAMENT  ....  8 

II.     Salvation  as  Taught  by  Jesus 27 

1.  Relation  to  the  Old  Testament   ...  30 

2.  The  Ethical  Factou 36 

3.  The  Religious  Factor 44 

III.  The  Pauline  Doctrine 54 

IV.  The  Doctrine  in  Hebrews 65 

V.     Salvation  and  Science 68. 

YI.     Secular  Salvation 74 

VII.     The  Intelligent,   Emotional,   and   Volun- 
tary Factors 80 

VIII.     "  Probation  "  and  Morals     .     .    \     .     .     .  85 

IX.    Universality  of  Salvation 92 


(&i  tijose  hjfjo  care  for  reltcjion,  i\)t  multitutie  uf  us  hiant 
t!jt  materialism  of  t\)c  ^pocalgpse ;  t\}t  fcb  toant  a  bague  re* 
lifltosttg.  .Sctencf,  fajf}ic!j  more  anlJ  more  teacljes  us  to  finB 
in  tf}e  utiapparent  tije  real,  toill  rjratiuaUg  serbe  to  ronquer 
tf}e  materialism  of  t\)t  popular  religion.  ®!je  frienHs  of 
barjue  rcligiositg,  on  tlje  otl)er  IjanU,  biill  lie  more  anU  more 
tautjljt  bs  erpertenre  tljat  a  tbcologg,  a  scientific  appreciation 
of  tije  facts  of  religion,  is  bianteti  for  religion ;  fiut  a  tije* 
ologs  ^W^  is  a  true  tljeologg,  not  a  false. 

Matthew  Arnold. 


SALVATION 


INTRODUCTION. 

'PVERY  religion  presupposes  an  unnatural, 
J—'  discordant  relation  of  man  to  the  spiritual 
laws  of  his  being.  Perfect,  he  would  have  no 
need  of  a  religion,  and  would  never  originate 
one.  Dependent  and  fallible,  the  sharp  sense 
of  weakness  and  spiritual  want  he  cannot  cast 
out,  nor  can  he  escape  the  obtrusive  presence 
of  the  higher  Powers.  Deep  mystery  surrounds 
him,  in  which  he  can  read  little  save  the  char- 
acters of  law,  written  large  and  luminous. 
Finding  himself  out  of  harmony  with  the  great 
order  into  which  he  is  cast,  he  is  filled  with 
unrest,  and  sets  himself  to  a  solution  of  the 
problem  of  reconciliation.  This  consciousness 
of  discord  and  the  struggle  with  the  problem 
how  to  attain  harmony  denote  the  beginning  of 
religion,  and  his  solution  of  the  problem  marks 
the  degree  and  character  of  his  spiritual  insight. 


6  SALVATION. 

If  his  thought  do  not  rise  above  Nature,  his  re- 
ligion will  begin  and  end  in  a  propitiation  of  her 
supposed  malign  forces.  If  he  attain  the  appre- 
hension of  a  personal  benignant  Power  and  Will 
superior  to  the  natural  order,  originating  and 
imposing  a  moral  law,  his  religion  will  be  a 
sense  of  dependence  upon  God,  worship,  com- 
munion, aspiration  for  harmony  with  Him,  inde- 
structible confidence  and  faith.  The  nature  of 
his  idea  of  God  will  determine  his  conception  of 
salvation. 

Salvation  implies  a  bondage  in  certain  evil 
conditions  from  which  it  is  a  deliverance.  It 
sinks  in  man's  thought  to  the  level  of  release 
from  temporal  misfortune,  social  or  political 
calamity,  sorrow,  physical  pain  or  discomfort,  or 
rises  into  the  realm  of  purely  spiritual  relations, 
according  to  the  note  of  his  interpretation  of  the 
Supreme  Being.  Accordingly,  its  doctrine  of 
salvation  reveals  the  inmost  character  of  a  re- 
ligion. It  is  its  vital  part.  Herein  does  religion 
affect  man  most  powerfully,  because  herein  it 
immediately  touches  his  life.  His  conduct  sinks 
to  a  lower  or  rises  to  a  higher  point  according 
as,  through  his  conception  of  salvation,  he  ap- 
prehends his  relation  to  God.     Whether  in  his 


SALVATION.  7 

worship  he  shall  grovel  in  rites,  ceremonies,  and 
bloody  offerings,  in  propitiation  and  atonement, 
to  reconcile  an  offended  and  changeable  Deity, 
or  in  spirit  and  truth  rise  into  communion  with 
Him  who  is  a  Spirit,  is  largely  determined  by  his 
ideas  regarding  this  central  point  in  religion. 

As  a  moral  being,  capable  of  conceiving  an 
ideal  development  and  endowed  with  a  passion 
for  its  attainment,  man  cannot  but  be  restless 
under  the  bondage  of  his  lower  impulses,  and 
struggle  with  an  energy  proportional  to  his 
ethical  enlightenment  for  deliverance,  or  salva- 
tion, from  the  degradation  into  which  they  bring 
him.  The  most  intensely  interesting  and  pa- 
thetic part  of  the  story  of  his  life  is  the  record 
of  this  struggle.  As  a  spiritual  being,  believing 
in  God  as  a  moral  -Governor  and  Father,  the 
sense  of  this  discord  between  his  higher  and 
lower  nature  is  sharpened  to  its  acutest  note  in 
the  consciousness  of  sin.  In  the  Biblical  con- 
ception of  man  this  latter  relation  is  brought 
into  prominence  with  great  pathos  and  power. 
Very  significant,  too,  it  is  that  on  the  first  page 
of  the  Bible,  in  the  legend  of  the  Fall,  is  sounded 
a  joyful  note  of  deliverance  in  the  announce- 
ment that  the  seed  of  the  woman,  the  essential 


8  SALVATION. 

man, — man  realizing  the  Divine  plan, — shall 
be  victorious  in  the  contest  with  the  seed  of  the 
serpent,  the  rude  and  brutal  forces  of  his  nature. 
The  bitterness  of  this  conflict  is  manifested  in 
the  long  and  all  but  hopeless  struggle  of  the 
Prophets  with  the  obduracy  of  their  people, 
gives  a  tone  of  sadness  and  despondency  to 
many  a  Biblical  writing,  and  finds  intensest  ex- 
pression in  the  sharp  cry  of  despair  and  pain 
wrung  from  the  soul  of  the  great  Apostle  to  the 
Gentiles. 

I.  —  Salvation  in  the  Old  Testament. 

If  the  sense  of  bondage  to  sin  is  profound  in 
the  human  soul,  not  less  so  is  that  of  the  ur- 
gency of  deliverance  from  this  condition.  No 
more  sagacious  interpretation  of  human  nature 
in  this  relation  has  been  made  by  any  of  the 
great  teachers  of  men  than  is  furnished  in  the 
works  of  the  conspicuous  writers  of  the  Old 
Testament.  So  obvious  is  this  to  every  careful 
and  unbiassed  student  of  these  writings,  that  one 
hazards  nothing  in  saying  that  the  religion  of 
the  Old  Testament  is  pre-eminent  among  the 
religions  of  antiquity  for  the  distinctness  and 
energy  of  its  conception  of  salvation.     What- 


SALVATION.  9 

ever  may  be  thought  of  the  remedy  which  it 
proposes  for  sin,  however  limited  its  spiritual 
horizon  may  be  deemed,  its  vigorous  accentu- 
ation of  the  dreadful  fact  of  sin  and  of  the  ur- 
gency of  deliverance  from  the  bondage  of  the 
violated  law  is  indisputable. 

The  writers  of  the  Old  Testament  set  forth 
no  philosophy  of  sin,  either  regarding  its  origin 
or  nature,  and  do  not  attempt  a  solution  of  the 
problems  which  it  has  presented  to  the  reflec- 
tion of  later  ages.  With  the  exception  of  the 
author  of  the  book  of  Job,  the}^  do  not  enter 
with  serious  purpose  upon  metaphysical  in- 
quiries. One  of  the  two  documents  which  criti- 
cism traces  in  the  Pentateuch  (the  Elohistic) 
does,  indeed,  give  a  mythical  account  of  the 
Fall  of  man  and  of  the  entrance  of  sin  into  the 
world,  assuming  the  human  race  to  have  begun 
its  existence  in  a  state  of  childlike  innocence 
and  ignorance  of  good  and  eviL  But  the  Je- 
hovist  narrator  knows  nothing  of  all  this,  and 
there  are  no  decided  marks  of  its  influence  in 
the  later  writers.  The  doctrine  of  Original  Sin, 
as  it  has  unhappily  been  set  forth  in  Christian 
theology,  finds  no  support  in  the  canonical  books 
of  the  Old  Testament.     The  natural  weakness 


10  SALVATION. 

and  tendency  to  sin  in  man  are  recognized, — 
that  the  imagination  of  his  heart  is  evil ;  that 
he  was  shapen  in  iniquity  and  conceived  in  sin  ; 
that  he  dwells  in  a  house  of  clay,  and  has  his 
foundation  in  the  dust/  etc.  It  is  thus  taught 
that  man  has  in  a  certain  sense  inherited  sin, 
that  is,  has  received  by  heredity  the  germ  of  its 
development,  and  is,  accordingly,  to  a  degree 
excusable  ;  that  God  has  not  willed  it,  but  only 
set  the  possibility  of  it  in  man,  whom  He  has 
created  with  the  power  of  self-determination 
and  of  overcoming  in  the  struggle  with  evil 
passions. 

The  Hebrew  conception  of  sin  finds  its  ex- 
planation only  in  connection  with  the  theo- 
cratic idea.  From  this  it  receives  its  predominant 
tone,  although  there  is  not  a  little  teaching 
which  proceeds  upon  general  ethical  and  spirit- 
ual principles.  The  law,  the  ceremonial  pre- 
scriptions, the  entire  cultus  are  enjoined  upon 
the  people  as  expressing  the  will  of  Jehovah, 
the  theocratic  head  of  the  nation ;  and  the  great- 
est importance  could  not  but  be  attached  to  all 
acts  and  observances  b}^  which  a  true  citizen  of 
the  theocracy  was  distinguished  from  the  rest 
^  Genesis  viii.  21 ;  Psalm  li.  7  ;  Job  iv.  17. 


SALVATION.  11 

of  mankind.  Hence  the  externality  which 
characterized  all  expression  of  religion,  and  the 
degenerate  formalism  which  stifled  worship. 
How  deep-seated  this  perversion  was,  appears 
in  the  vehement  denunciations  of  the  cere- 
monial observances  by  the  Prophets,  who  stand 
forth,  one  might  almost  dare  to  say,  as  the 
preachers  of  a  new  morality  and  religion,  and 
teach  that  only  he  who  is  of  a  contrite  spirit 
and  trembleth  at  the  word  of  God  shall  find 
favor  in  His  sight.  Yet  are  not  the  Prophets 
themselves  outdone  in  the  denunciation  of  the- 
ocratic sins,  or  offences  against  Jehovah  as  the 
Ruler  of  the  nation,  who  resents  as  injuries  to 
Himself  all  acts  prejudicial  to  its  welfare. 

The  immediate  personal  relation  of  sin  to 
Jehovah  is  strongly  set  forth  in  the  Hebrew 
theology  and  theodicy.  Jehovah  is  represented 
as  having  His  people  in  charge,  as  having  en- 
tered into  a  covenant  with  them  and  earnestly 
seeking  their  welfare.  On  His  part  the  cove- 
nant is  sacredly  kept,  for  He  is  the  Righteous 
One.  Through  the  teachers  and  Prophets  whom 
He  has  commissioned,  His  will  has  been  made 
known  and  strictly  enjoined.  But  the  people 
are  unrighteous,  breakers  of  the  covenant,  idol- 


12  SALVATION. 

aters.  Their  violation  of  the  law  is  character- 
ized as  sedition,  revolt,  apostasy.  It  is  an 
arrant  wrong,  a  foolish  wickedness,  an  aimless 
and  unsubstantial  proceeding,  since  it  is  di- 
rected agahist  the  All-Powerful,  who  will  smite 
His  enemies  with  confusion  and  overthrow. 
Enemies  of  God,  indeed,  are  they  who  break 
His  covenant  and  disobey  His  law,  and  "  He  will 
wound  their  head  and  hairy  scalp."  The  an- 
thropopathism  of  the  Hebrew  writers,  of  which 
a  considerable  residuum  is  left  after  due  allow- 
ance has  been  made  for  Oriental  modes  of  ex- 
pression, has  colored  their  idea  of  sin  as  related 
to  the  Deity,  and  perhaps  led  them  to  give  ex- 
cessive prominence  to  this  side  of  it.  The 
wrath  of  God  against  His  "  enemies,"  however 
these  writers  may  have  conceived  it,  and  the 
swift  overthrow  which  awaits  them,  are  expres- 
sions so  often  recurring  that  they  can  hardly 
be  regarded  as  merely  poetic  ornaments  of 
speech.  Rather,  such  words  convey  what  to 
those  who  so  constantly  use  them  was  a  terrible 
reality. 

The  phase  of  sin  in  which  it  is  immediately 
related  to  man  —  its  human  side  —  is  likewise 
set  forth  in  the  Old  Testament  with  thorough 


SALVATION.  13 

earnestness  and  in  a  tone  of  energetic  warning. 
The  swift  and  certain  consequences  of  disobedi- 
ence are  proclaimed ;  mischief  and  destruction 
pursue  the  transgressor,  and  no  human  acu- 
men, no  joining  of  hand  in  hand,  can  avert  the 
doom.  Are  not  the  eyes  of  the  Lord  in  every 
place  ?  The  wings  of  the  morning  cannot  bear 
one  where  He  is  not  in  His  protecting  or 
avenging  power. 

The  consequences  of  sin,  and  therefore  the 
nature  of  salvation,  are,  however,  more  definitely 
determined  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  the- 
ocracy. Sin,  as  ordinarily  treated  in  the  Old 
Testament,  being  a  theocratic  offence,  receives 
in  reference  to  its  effects  a  theocratic  interpre- 
tation. Now  the  theocrac}^  being  regarded  from 
the  "  particularistic  "  point  of  view  as  a  temporal 
order  of  things,  must  find  its  completion  in  the 
world.  Accordingly,  the  Hebrew  view  of  sin 
does  not  include  a  retribution  future  to  the 
present  life.  In  the  story  of  the  Fall,  death  is 
announced  as  the  penalty  of  disobedience.  But 
this  doctrine  appears  to  have  exerted  no  influ- 
ence upon  Hebrew  theology.  Indeed,  the  ac- 
count is  not,  on  the  surface  at  least,  consistent 
with  itself;  for  in  Genesis  iii.  19,  man  is  spoken 


14  SALVATION. 

of  as  naturally  mortal,  and  in  verse  22  it  is  im- 
plied that  the  only  way  to  prevent  his  acquiring 
immortality  is  to  cut  off  his  approach  to  the  tree 
of  life.  Hence  death  cannot  be  regarded,  ac- 
cording to  the  legend  itself,  as  the  consequence 
of  disobedience,  unless  indirectly,  through  ex- 
clusion from  the  garden  where  man  might  have 
eaten  of  the  unforbidden  tree  of  life. 

The  popular  Hebrew  doctrine  of  the  relation 
of  death  to  sin  is  not,  however,  without  close 
relation  to  this  ancient  tradition  thus  inter- 
preted. For  while  length  of  days  and  temporal 
prosperity  are  regarded  as  the  sure  reward  of 
the  righteous,  it  is  taught  that  the  expectation 
of  the  wicked  shall  perish,  that  their  days  shall 
be  shortened,  —  like  sheep  are  they  laid  in  the 
grave. ^  On  the  other  hand,  long  life  is  prom- 
ised as  the  reward  of  obedience  to  tlie  law  of 
God ;  and  life  and  good,  death  and  evil,  are  set 
over  against  each  other  in  the  solemn  summary 
of  the  divine  order  of  the  theocracy .^  Probably 
no  stronger  and  in  tenser  expressions  of  the  tem- 
poral disaster  which  a  wicked  life  may  cause 
are  found  in   any  literature  than  the  Biblical 

i  Proverbs  x.  25,  27  ;  Psalm  xlix. 

2  Exodus  XX.  12;  Deuteronomy  xxx.  15-20. 


SALVATION.  15 

writers  employ.  Their  insight  is  in  this  regard 
remarkably  clear.  They  are  seers  to  whom  the 
wisdom  of  ages  and  the  lessons  of  human  ex- 
perience stand  forth  clearly  defined  in  their 
naked  reality.  In  how  fine  a  contrast  are  the 
ways  of  the  righteous  and  of  the  evil  doer  set 
in  these  words :  "  The  path  of  the  just  is  as 
the  shining  light,  that  shineth  more  and  more 
unto  the  perfect  day  ;  "  but  "  the  way  of  the 
wicked  is  as  darkness :  they  know  not  at  what 
they  stumble."  How  terrible  the  picture  of  the 
wicked  man,  whose  spiritual  vision  is  dimmed, 
going  down  into  ever-increasing  darkness,  and 
at  last  losing  moral  discernment,  so  that  he  does 
not  know  at  what  he  stumbles  ! 

The  fact,  however,  that  in  actual  life  the 
wicked  often  appear  prosperous,  and  the  righ- 
teous suffer  affliction,  presented  to  the  Hebrew  a 
problem  whicli  he  could  not  solve  by  postponing 
the  adjustment  to  a  future  life,  because  of  the 
temporal  limitation  of  his  view.  He  comforted 
himself  as  best  he  could  with  the  reflection  that 
the  death  of  the  wicked  must  be  as  dreadful  as 
that  of  the  righteous  was  beautiful  and  full  of 
peace.  In  despair  of  any  solution  of  this  problem, 
some  of  the  less  devout  and  perhaps  less  profound 


16  SALVATION. 

adopted  the  point  of  view  of  pessimisftic  indiffer- 
entism,  which  found  expression  in  the  epicurean 
motto,  "  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow 
we  die."  The  pious,  however,  cherished  such 
slender  consolation  as  they  could  find  in  their 
temporal  hopes.  The  happiness  of  the  Avicked 
endures,  they  reasoned,  only  for  a  day  ;  speedily 
are  they  hurried  off  the' scene  of  existence  :  but 
the  righteous  are  delivered  from  the  peril  of 
death,  and  at  least  nmj  enjoy  a  long  life  and  a 
peaceful  demise.  In  the  admonitions  of  the 
writer  of  Proverbs,  in  the  exhortations  of  the 
Prophets,  and  in  the  warning  and  exulting 
strains  of  the  Psalmists,  a  utilitarian  practical 
wisdom  attains  a  most  energetic  expression. 

The  Hebrew  conception  of  salvation  was  de- 
termined by  that  of  sin  and  its  consequences,  as 
held  under  the  law  and  by  the  Prophets.  Sal- 
vation, so  far  as  it  was  legally  and  ethically 
regarded,  was  simply  a  bondage  to  the  law. 
Deliverance,  indeed,  it  was  from  the  bondage 
which  the  broken  law  imposed  in  the  form  of 
penalty  ;  but  under  the  intolerable  burden  of 
ceremonial  and  a  tedious  cultus,  he  still  remained 
who  had  performed  the  rites  and  offered  the 
atoning    sacrifice.       Jehovah,  through  the  law, 


SALVATION.  17 

was  the  Saviour  who,  by  severe  discipline,  force, 
and  penalty,  restrains  the  evil  passions  of  men. 
He  is  conceived  as  the  Supreme  Lawgiver  and 
Executive,  a  being  of  unapproachable  majesty, 
revealing  Himself  in  the  terrific  forces  of  Nature, 
—  in  thunder,  lightning,  earthquake.  A  free, 
joyous,  and  peaceful  development,  a  hopeful 
striving  to  attain  an  ideal  spiritual  life,  a  serene 
abiding  in  love  and  communion  with  God  as 
Father,  were  necessarily  impossible  from  this 
theological  point  of  view.  Salvation  is  a  nega- 
tion, a  release  from  fear  and  pain,  rather  than 
an  impulse  to  a  fresh  and  positive  ethical  striv- 
ing. No  one  who  has  understood  the  real  nature 
of  the  Hebrew  legalism  will  think  Paul's  ar- 
raignment of  it  too  strong.  There  is  a  note  of 
melanchol}',  a  sense  of  bondage  and  weariness 
in  that  vast  system  of  formalism  and  severity, 
which  are  in  strong  contrast  with  the  joyful 
consciousness  of  liberty,  expressed  by  no  one 
with  more  force  and  fervor  than  by  this  same 
Paul.  Not  wholly  wanting,  indeed,  to  the 
Hebrew  religious  poetry  are  the  cheerful  tone  of 
mind  and  the  exhortation  to  rejoice  in  the  Lord. 
But  how  often  does  the  spirit  in  which  the  re- 
joicing is  called  for  throw  over  it  a  veil  of  sad- 


18  SALVATION. 

ness !  —  " Let  the  people  tremble  •  "  "a  fire  go- 
eth  before  Him  and  burnetii  up  His  enemies." 

As  a  means  of  counteracting  or  breaking  the 
relentless  force  of  the  law  and  furnishing  de- 
liverance, or  salvation,  from  its  curse,  sacrifices 
held  a  prominent  place  in  Hebrew  legalism.  In 
the  vast  number  of  cases  in  which  the  law  was 
violated  through  ignorance,  weakness  of  the 
flesh,  or  error,  provision  was  made  to  atone  for 
the  fault,  to  make  restitution,  by  the  offering  of 
sacrifices  to  avert  the  withdrawing  of  the  Divine 
favor  and  the  retributive  consequences  of  the 
offence.  It  is  not  to  the  present  purpose  to 
enter  into  a  minute  account  of  the  sacrificial 
prescripts.  Suffice  it  to  remark  that  the  com- 
parative history  of  religions  shows  the  high  an- 
tiquity and  wide  prevalence  of  propitiatory 
offerings  to  the  gods.  The  institution  of  sacri- 
fices was  not  of  Mosaic  origin,  nor  does  the 
elaborate  form  of  the  ceremonial  as  it  is  laid 
down  in  the  Pentateuch  date  from  an  earlier 
period  than  the  age  of  Solomon.  The  religious 
feeling  out  of  which  the  sacrificial  system  and 
ceremonial  sprang  was  that  the  Divine  favor 
could  be  secured  by  the  offering  of  some  valu- 
able  possession.      The   burnt-offering  was    an 


SALVATION.  19 

expression  of  reverence  towards  God,  of  devo- 
tion to  Him,  and  willingness  for  His  service. 
The  thank-offering  was  a  return  for  a  benefit 
received.  The  sin-offering  expressed  an  ac- 
knowledgment of  the  disturbance  through  trans- 
gression of  the  peaceful  relation  with  the  Deity, 
and  was  offered  with  a  view  to  reconciliation,  to 
annulment  of  the  sin  in  the  sense  that  its  penal 
consequences  should  not  follow  if  the  sacrifice 
were  graciously  received.  Symbolical,  perhaps, 
in  a  general  sense,  these  sacrifices  were.  But 
there  can  be  little  doubt  that  the  sin-offering 
was  regarded  as  substitutional,  or  at  least  as  fur- 
nishing satisfaction  for  the  offence  on  account 
of  which  it  was  made.  '*  The  life  of  the  flesh," 
which  '^  is  in  the  blood,"  "  is  given  upon  the 
altar  to  make  an  atonement  for  the  life  "  of  the 
tr-ansgressor,  forfeited  by  the  sin.i  The  analogy 
of  other  ancient  religions  is  not  without  signifi- 
cance in  relation  to  the  interpretation  of  this 
sacrificial  rite.  Precisely  in  this  idea  of  the  im- 
portance in  itself  of  the  external  side  of  the  sac- 
rifice lay  the  imperfection  and  the  peril  of  the 

1  Leviticus  xvii.  11.  This  view  is  philologically  established 
by  the  fact  that  the  Hebrew  word  for  sin-offering  comes  from 
another  which  signifies  "  to  make  restitution  for  something 
lost,"  etc. 


20  SALVATION. 

entire  ciiltus.  TJie  belief  that  the  offering  />er  se 
was  a  meiitorioLis  act,  and  a  magical  means  of 
propitiating  the  Deity  and  averting  the  penal 
consequences  of  disobedience,  could  not  but  re- 
sult in  the  loss  of  the  sentiment  of  worship  and 
the  sNvay  of  a  degrading  formalism,  —  in  such 
a  moral  and  spiritual  degeneracy,  in  fact,  as 
called  forth  the  vehement  denunciation  of  the 
Prophets. 

While  the  acceptance  of  a  sacrifice  may  be 
regarded  from  a  strictly  legal  point  of  view 
as  an  acknowledgment  of  satisfaction,  it  was 
deemed  in  the  Hebrew  theology  a  modification 
of  the  law  in  the  interest  of  mildness.  There 
was  found,  therefore,  room  for  merc3^  God,  as 
the  Saviour  of  His  people,  is  accordingly  repre- 
sented as  forgiving  sin.  As  inexorably  severe, 
He  is  said,  indeed,  to  visit  the  sins  of  tlie 
fathers  upon  the  children ;  but  in  the  later 
development  of  the  people  this  doctrine  is 
renounced.  Under  the  law  certain  sins  are 
passed  by  on  account  of  sacrifices  offered  ac- 
cording to  the  ceremonial  requirements.  But 
the  Prophets  attained  a  higher  point  of  view, 
and  represented  the  Divine  forgiveness  as  a  free 
act  of  grace,  conditioned,  indeed,  upon  repent- 


SALVATION.  21 

ance  and  abandonment  of  sinful  conduct.  It 
should  be  kept  in  mind,  however,  that  the  domi- 
nant note  in  the  Hebrew  doctrine  of  forgive- 
ness and  salvation  is  deliverance  from  the 
external,  temporal  consequences  attached  to 
sin  by  the  law.  It  would  be  a  great  error  to 
read  into  this  theology  the  ethical  and  spiritual 
apprehension  of  sin  as  a  violation  of  the  nature 
of  man,  the  effects  of  which  follow  in  the  soul 
by  irreversible  natural  law.  It  is  arbitrary,  not 
natural,  law  which  is  taken  into  account.  The 
doctrine,  however,  that  righteousness,  obedi- 
ence, and  harmony  with  God  are  "  good  "  and 
desirable,  and  that  they  insure  peace  as  well  as 
prosperity,  does  not  fail  of  frequent  and  decided 
expression.  In  proportion  as  the  Psalmists  and 
Prophets  rise  above  the  earlier  legalism  they 
attain  a  more  spiritual  point  of  view.  The 
theocratic  conception  of  forgiveness  and  salva- 
tion was,  however,  scarcely  transcended  by  any 
of  the  writers  of  the  canonical  books  of  the 
Old  Testament.  To  them  Jehovah  was  the 
God  of  Israel.  The  Divine  mercy  and  love 
were  for  the  members  of  the  theocratic  com- 
munity only.  Destruction  would  overwhelm  all 
who  were  enemies  of  these.     The  hope,  which 


22  SALVATION. 

finds  expression  in  some  of  the  Prophets,  that 
all  the  ends  of  the  earth  shall  see  the  salvation 
of  God,  could  have  found  its  expected  realiza- 
tion only  in  the  conversion  of  the  heathen  to 
the  theocratic  worship.  The  limits  of  parti- 
cularism were  not  passed  until  Judaism  came 
in  contact  with  Greek  culture.  Whether  the 
broadening  of  mind  was  the  result  of  inter- 
course with  foreign  and  particularly  Hellenistic 
tendencies,  or  came  by  an  inward  development, 
may  be  open  to  question ;  but  in  the  apocry- 
phal Book  of  Wisdom  are  found  conceptions  of 
God  which  are  closely  akin  to  those  of  Jesus. 
He  is  here  represented  as  a  Spirit  friendly  to 
man.  Great  and  small  has  God  created,  and 
He  cares  equally  for  all.  He  loves  all  that  is, 
and  abhors  nothing  which  he  has  made  ;  for  if 
He  hated  anything  He  would  not  have  created 
it.  His  imperishable  spirit  is  in  all.  This  noble 
idea  may,  however,  very  naturall}^  have  been 
derived  from  the  ancient  Hebrew  story  of  the 
creation  of  man,  the  profound  significance  of 
which  had  for  ages  been  buried  under  a  vast 
system  of  exclusiveness  and  national  conceit. 

Under  the  law   there  was,  however,  a  large 
number  of  sins  for  which  no  forgiveness  was 


SALVATION.  23 

provided.  The  transgressor  who  had  been 
found  guilty  of  these  could  hope  for  no  salva- 
tion. He  was  doomed.  He  must  die,  and 
this  was  the  end  as  an  awful  warning  to  "those 
which  remain."  For  sacrificing  to  Moloch,  a 
man  was  condemned  to  be  put  to  death  by 
stoning.  If  a  brother,  son,  daughter,  wife,  or 
friend  entice  a  man  to  worship  other  gods,  the 
man  so  enticed  is  ordered  to  "surely  kill"  the 
entice r  ;  and  the  people  are  enjoined  to  stone 
him  to  death,  to  make  his  destruction  sure. 
For  blasphemy  the  oifender,  whether  a  native 
or  a  stranger,  is  doomed  to  death,  "and  all  the 
congregation  shall  certainly  stone  him."  The 
man  who  "  will  not  hearken  unto  the  priest" 
has  committed  an  unpardonable  sin  and  must 
die,  that  the  people  may  "  fear  and  do  no  more 
presumptuously."  It  is  commanded  in  heart- 
breaking detail  that  the  father  and  mother  of 
"a  stubborn  and  rebellious  son  "  shall  seize  him 
and  bring  him  as  accusers  to  the  elders  of  his 
city,  that  all  the  men  of  his  city  may  stone  him 
till  he  be  dead.^     The  numerous  curses  in  the 

1  In  the  twentieth  chapter  of  Numbers  is  a  long  list  of  of- 
fences for  which  death  alone  could  atone.  Tlie  sad  Book  of 
Deuteronomy  abounds  in  them. 


24  SALVATION. 

twenty-eighth  chapter  of  Deuteronomy,  pro- 
nounced upon  tliose  who  sliould  not  keep  the 
law,  are  equivalent  to  sentences  of  death  or  an- 
athemas worse  than  death.  Repulsive  as  all 
this  unmitigated  severity  is  to  a  humane  senti- 
ment, it  should  not  be  overlooked  that  a  tone 
of  profound  moral  earnestness  pervades  the 
Old  Testament;  that  duty^  with  whatever  de- 
fects of  ethical  conception  it  may  have  been 
apprehended,  is  enjoined  with  earnest  emphasis 
and  endless  repetition  ;  that  the  will  of  God  is 
incessantly  proclaimed  as  the  supreme,  invio- 
lable law  ;  that  the  disaster  and  ruin  wrought 
by  sin  are  exhibited  in  so  terrible  a  light  as  to 
excite  deep  horror  of  it  in  the  minds  of  the 
people,  and  that  the  praises  of  righteousness 
are  sung  in  sweet  and  lofty  strains.  Much 
easier,  indeed,  it  is  to  criticise  this  religious 
system  than  to  invent  another  which  could 
have  been  established  under  the  conditions 
which  determined  this,  or,  if  it  had  existed, 
would  have  served  the  educational  end  which 
this  did  undoubtedly  serve. 

The  Hebrew  conception  of  salvation  can  be 
understood  only  in  connection  with  the  national 
religious  and  patriotic  spirit.     This   is  true   at 


SALVATION.  25 

least  of  the  later  development  of  the  doctrine 
in  the  Prophets.  To  these  great  teachers  Israel 
appeared  as  the  people  of  mankind,  —  a  world- 
people,  having  a  providential  calling  which  dis- 
tinguished them  from  all  other  races,  —  and  as  a 
mission-people  in  the  interest  of  monotheistic 
worship.  Idolatry,  all  worship  of  other  gods 
than  Jehovah,  it  is  their  calling  to  overcome, 
whether  in  their  midst  or  among  the  surround- 
ing peoples.  An  immediate  personal  responsi- 
bility to  God  —  no  ceremonial  intervening  — 
is  emphasized.  The  heavy  guilt  which  rests 
upon  the  people  can  be  removed  by  no  sacri- 
fice but  that  of  sin  itself,  —  by  repentance  and 
return  to  right  worship  and  life.  The  inner 
law  of  the  conscience  comes  in  the  Prophets  to 
clear  recognition  and  forcible  expression.  The 
great  national  mission  is,  however,  kept  con- 
stantly in  view,  and  salvation  is  generally 
conceived  in  relation  to  this,  and  as  including 
whatever  will  further  this  providential  calling 
and  work,  —  deliverance  from  idolatry,  from  the 
power  of  enemies,  from  exile  and  all  temporal 
evil,  such  as  oppression,  violence,  and  internal 
dissension.  Bat  one  personal  Saviour  is  recog- 
nized in  this  prophetic  teaching,  and   that  one 


26  SALVATION. 

is  Jehovah,  the  all-mighty,  in  whose  right  hand 
is  victory,  and  He  will  rear  and  nurture  Israel 
as  a  peculiar  people.  For  their  salvation  —  that 
is,  for  the  preservation  of  their  national  mono- 
theistic integrit}^  —  He  employs  the  teachings 
of  the  Prophets,  misfortunes  of  various  kinds, 
and  especially  does  He  scourge  them  with  the 
heathen  nations,  whom  He  brings  down  upon 
them  (such  is  the  Hebrew  conception  of  history) 
to  lay  waste  and  destroy,  to  slay  and  carry  into 
exile  for  their  disobedience  and  revolt.  It  be- 
longs, however,  to  the  point  of  view  of  the 
Prophets,  while  they  recognize  Jehovah  as  the 
true  Saviour  of  His  people,  to  mediate  the  sal- 
vation through  the  sufferings  of  the  righteous, 
who  in  some  sense  atone  for  the  sins  of  the 
nation.  Thus  the  second  Isaiah  (chapters  xL- 
Ixvi.)  looks  for  the  "  healing "  of  the  people 
by  means  of  the  "  stripes  "  which  the  faithful 
theocratic  remnant  had  suffered  in  the  exile. 
Some  of  the  Prophets  do,  however,  expect  a 
future  salvation  through  a  personal  deliverer  of 
the  line  of  David.  Out  of  Bethlehem  should 
come  forth  one  who  should  be  *'  a  ruler  in 
Israel  ; "  he  should  be  a  "  rod  out  of  the  stem 
of  Jesse,"    ''Wonderful,   Counsellor,  Prince  of 


SALVATION.  27 

Peace  ; "  he  should  sit  on  the  throne  of  David, 
restore  the  fallen  power  of  the  nation,  and  set 
free,  cleanse,  and  glorify  the  enslaved  and  hu- 
miliated people.  The  failure  of  this  hope  to 
be  realized  in  the  terms  in  which  it  was  con- 
ceived, illustrates  the  defects  and  limitations  of 
the  Hebrew  idea  of  salvation,  which,  though 
occasionally  showing  gleams  of  a  noble  spirit- 
ual conception,  was  in  general  hampered  by  its 
theocratic  point  of  view,  and  confined  to  an 
earthly  and  temporal  scope.  Under  these  con- 
ditions it  was  not  adapted  to  become  a  perma- 
nent factor  in  a  universal  religion. 

II.  —  Salvation  as  taught  by  Jesus. 

A  doctrine  of  salvation  appropriate  to  a 
world-religion  was  presented  by  the  great 
Teacher,  who  by  reason  of  it  has  earned  the 
title  of  Saviour  of  Mankind.^  This  title  will  be 
the  more  readily  accorded  to  him  by  all  the 
world,  the  more  the  truly  spiritual  and  universal 
character  of  his  teaching  is  recognized,  the  more 
it  is  apprehended  in  its  wonderful  simplicity 
and  liberated  from  the  burden  of  dogma  under 

1  A  forthcoming  volume  in  this  series  of  Manuals  is  en- 
titled "  The  Saviour  of  the  World." —  Editor. 


28  SALVATION. 

which  it  has  been  for  ages  smothered  and  dis- 
torted. As  a  spiritual  interpreter  of  human 
nature,  Jesus  of  Nazareth  has  never  been  sur- 
passed. As  an  embodiment  and  manifestation 
of  whatever  is  noblest,  purest,  and  tenderest  in 
man,  he  stands  unrivalled  among  the  great  re- 
ligious teachers  of  the  ages.  Other  personality 
so  morally  fruitful,  so  abounding  in  intensity  of 
spiritual  power,  has  never  appeared  in  history. 
In  him  all  that  is  most  godlike  and  most  human 
was  united  in  harmony,  and  found  consummate 
expression.  His  life  is  at  once  the  enigma  of 
the  centuries  and  the  solution  of  their  problems. 
In  the  universality  of  liis  religious  genius,  in 
the  scope  and  sureness  of  his  ethical  insight,  in 
the  depth  of  his  sympathy  and  the  breadth  and 
lucidity  of  his  understanding,  in  the  intensity 
of  his  sufferings  and  the  completeness  of  his  vic- 
tory, he  was  the  true  Son  of  Man.  Tempted  in 
all  points,  and  assailed  by  the  powers  of  sin  and 
the  ferocity  of  enraged  and  brutal  men,  he  held 
with  a  firm  grasp  the  sceptre  of  spiritual  ascen- 
dancy which  shall  never  depart  from  his  hand. 

Although  reared  in  the  religious  faith  of  his 
people,  nurtured  in  the  law  and  the  Prophets, 
Jesus  recognized  and  adopted  only  the  spiritual 


SALVATION.  29 

and  universal  principles  of  Hebraism  and  Juda- 
ism.    The  imperishable  hope  of  salvation,  which 
had  been  cherished  in  the  hearts  of  Jews  through 
many  ages  of  oppression,  he  sought  to  rekindle, 
indeed,  but  only  in  giving  it  an  entirely  new 
interpretation.      In  the   alchemy  of  genius   all 
that  it  touches  is  turned  into  gold.     Out  of  the 
spiritual  crucible  of  Jesus  the  Jewish  conception 
of  salvation  came  forth  transfigured.     Now  no 
longer  did  it  bear  its  antique  form  of  national 
and  theocratic  self-seeking,  its  cramped  and  de- 
graded  aspect  of  bondage  to  the  law.      Inter- 
preting the  striving  and  aspiration  of  mankind 
for   deliverance    from    servitude   to  sin   in    the 
light  of  the  great  idea  of  the  universal  Father- 
hood, he    exalted  salvation    to  the   rank   of  a 
world-principle  of  life.     Not  now  was  it  to  be 
consummated    in    Jerusalem    rebuilt    and    the 
magnificence  of  the  temple  restored,  not  in  cere- 
mony of  sacrifice  and  voice  of  prayer  on  Geri- 
zim,  nor  yet  in  the  pitying  answer  to  the  mute 
despair  of  exiles  by  the  rivers  of  Babylon,  which 
should    wake   their   silent   harps   to  theocratic 
melodies,  but  in  the  deliverance  of  a  world  from 
the    dominion    of   selfishness,    in    the  universal 
reign  of  tlie  kingdom  of  God. 


80  SALVATION. 

1.  Relation  to  the  Old  Testament.  —  The  po- 
sition which  Jesus  assumed  towards  the  sacred 
writings  of  the  Jews,  regarded  both  as  docu- 
ments of  a  theocratic  national  religion  and  as 
literature,  indicates  the  point  of  view  from  which 
his  teaching  of  salvation  must  be  considered. 
In  the  freedom  of  his  spirit,  in  the  grandeur  of 
his  conception  of  life,  and  in  the  clearness  of  his 
insight  into  the  divine  order  of  the  world,  he 
resembled  and  yet  surpassed  the  greatest  of  the 
Prophets.  The  most  spiritual  of  these  teachers 
had  no  vision  of  a  restored  Jerusalem  without 
its  temple  and  altar,  which  shouM  stand  as 
symbols  not  only  of  worship,  but  of  national 
supremacy  and  splendor.  But  the  establishment 
of  a  political,  theocratic  kingdom  Jesus  repudi- 
ated as  foreign  to  his  aim  and  opposed  to  the 
spirit  of  his  mission.  He  sought  to  dissipate  in 
the  minds  of  his  followers  all  dreams  of  worldly 
dominion.  As  he  came  not  to  be  ministered 
unto,  but  to  minister,  so  he  taught  them  that  in 
his  kingdom  the  position  of  servant  was  the 
chief  honor  to  be  attained.  He  regarded  the 
whole  sacrificial  system,  the  theocratic  striving 
and  ambition,  as  nourishing  the  selfishness  which 
it  was  his  mission  to  overcome  by  fostering  the 


SALVATION.  31 

spirit  of  universal  love.  To  the  temporal  Mes- 
sianic prophecies  and  expectations  of  his  nation, 
he  gave  no  heed  and  no  encouragement.  ''  My 
kingdom  is  not  of  this  world,"  was  his  answer 
to  the  ineffectual  fanaticism  of  those  of  his  own 
time  in  whom  the  national  spirit  of  the  Prophets 
still  excited  futile  strivings  after  political  liberty 
and  glory.  He  expressed  no  sympath}^  with 
the  bondage  to  Rome,  under  which  his  people 
groaned,  nor  with  their  fruitless  longing  for  de- 
liverance from  its  chains.  He  even  enjoined 
that  what  Avas  due  to  Caesar  should  be  rendered 
to  him,  and  did  not  neglect  to  add  that  duties 
to  God  must  also  be  discharged.  Not  the  re- 
storer of  the  ancient  national  supremacy  would 
he  be,  but  the  founder  of  a  new  kingdom. 

In  Matthew  v.  17-21,  Jesus  makes  a  formal 
declaration  of  his  relation  to  the  economy  of  the 
Old  Testament.  As  to  the  law  or  the  Prophets, 
he  came  not,  he  says,  to  destroy,  but  to  fulfil  them. 
Not  one  jot  or  tittle  of  the  law  shall  pass  till  all 
be  fulfilled  ;  and  he  that  breaketh  the  least  of 
the  commandments,  and  teacheth  men  so,  shall 
be  called  the  least  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven. 
Yet  in  the  same  discourse  he  takes  a  position 
above  the  law,  abrogating  or  modifying  pariicu- 


32  SALVATION. 

lar  commandments,  and  setting  up  his  personal 
authority  unqualifiedly  against  that  of  '^  those  of 
old  time."  In  respect  to  the  law  against  homi- 
cide he  places  the  disposition  on  an  equal  foot- 
ing with  the  act.  As  to  adultery,  it  is  within, 
in  the  cherished  lustful  passion  as  well  as  in  the 
act  contemplated  in  the  law.  The  law  of  di- 
vorce is  essentially  qualified,  and  that  of  re- 
taliation is  abrogated,  love  even  of  enemies 
being  enjoined  in  the  place  of  taking  an  eye  for 
an  eye.  The  difficulty  in  reconciling  these  an- 
tithetic declarations  does  not  lie  in  the  opposi- 
tion of  the  general  statement  of  Jesus  that  he 
came  to  fulfil  the  law  and  the  Prophets  to  the 
free  and  independent  position  taken  afterwards. 
For  in  this  very  position  is  unmistakably  indi- 
cated the  manner  in  which  he  would  have  the 
law  fulfilled.  In  harmony  with  the  spirit  of  all 
his  teaching,  he  here  emphasizes  the  principle 
that  the  moral  quality  of  actions  is  determined 
by  the  disposition,  and  that  the  true  ethical  ful- 
filment of  the  law  is  not  in  the  outward  act,  but 
in  the  inward  feeling  and  intention.  The  fun- 
damental opposition  of  his  doctrine  to  the 
legalism  of  the  Old  Testament  could  not  be 
more    forcibly    expressed    by    one   who    might 


SALVATION.  33 

desire  to  counteract  the  defects  of  that  system, 
while  retaining  whatever  in  it  was  of  universal 
and  permanent  worth.  But  the  point  of  her- 
meneutical  contention  is  in  the  declaration  that 
not  one  jot  (the  smallest  Hebrew  letter),  nor 
tittle  (the  hook,  by  which  nearly  similar  Hebrew 
letters  are  distinguished  from  one  another), 
should  pass  till  all  be  fulfilled,  and  that  he  who 
breaks  the  least  of  the  commandments  should 
be  least  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  The  prob- 
lem is  to  reconcile  this  emphatic  language  of 
legalism  and  the  letter  with  the  subsequent 
teaching.  To  explain  it  by  calling  the  expres- 
sion hyperbolic  is  to  evade  the  difficulty.  For 
in  saying  that  he  came  to  fulfil  the  law,  Jesus 
had  already  expressed  himself  quite  fully,  in 
a  general  way,  and  these  words  can  indicate 
nothinof  short  of  an  intention  to  set  forth  in  most 
emphatic  terms  the  legaHstic  point  of  view. 
They  convey  a  universal  declaration,  and  cannot, 
accordingly,  be  referred  to  his  own  fulfilment 
of  the  law. 

The  difficulties  in  the  interpretation  of  the 
passage  have  led  some  eminent  scholars  to  doubt 
that  the  words  were  spoken  by  Jesus,  on  the 
ground  of  their  inconsistency  with  the  spirit  of 


34  SALVATION. 

his  doctrine  in  general,  and  with  his  unmis- 
takable attitude  towards  the  legalism  and  liter- 
alism which  they  express.  No  solution  of  the 
difficulty  which  they  present  can  probably  be 
given  which  will  satisfy  every  one.  Whether  by 
exegetical  pressure  they  be  brought  into  accord 
with  what  follows  or  be  set  aside  as  added  to 
the  tradition  or  the  record,  they  must  be  in  any 
case  subjected  to  a  somewhat  violent  treatment. 
For  yield  they  must  to  the  force  of  the  analogy 
of  the  teaching  and  spirit  of  Jesus.  His  attitude 
in  respect  to  the  traditional  legalism  and  the  liter- 
alism of  the  law  is  indicated  in  his  declarations 
regarding  the  Sabbath.  When  his  disciples  are 
censured  for  plucking  the  ears  of  corn  on  that 
day  and  he  for  healing  the  sick,  he  declares 
himself  superior  to  the  Sabbath,  thus  putting 
his  personal  authority  against  prescripts  of  the 
law.  In  his  transfiguring  of  the  Sabbath  it 
becomes  simply  an  institution  to  serve  man,  not 
to  enslave  him.  Man  is  placed  above  it.  It 
was  made  for  him,  not  he  for  it ;  and  he  may 
freely  use  it,  according  to  his  own  conscience, 
as  it  will  most  promote  his  welfare.  To  the 
complaint  of  the  scribes  and  Pharisees  that  his 
disciples  neglected  the  washing  of  hands  before 


SALVATION.  35 

eating,  he  answered  that  they  made  the  law  in- 
effectual by  their  traditions,  and  he  took  occa- 
sion to  call  the  multitude  together  and  teach  that 
not  that  which  enters  into  a  man  defiles  him, 
but  that  which  proceeds  out  of  his  mouth,  thus 
showing  that  he  regarded  the  Mosaic  law  as  to 
purification  as  morally  indifferent.     That  he  at- 
tributed to  the  law  only  a  relative  validity  is 
evident  from  his  deriving  the  Mosaic  permission 
of  divorce  from  regard  to  the  hardness  of  the 
people's   hearts.     It  is  apparent,  then,  that  he 
ascribed  to  the  law  no  absolute  and  binding  au- 
thority.    If  he  did  not  openly  renounce  it ;  if 
he  enjoined  upon  his  followers  to  do  whatever 
the  scribes  and  Pharisees  sitting  in  Moses'  seat 
should  bid  them  do ;  if  he  in  his  denunciation 
of  the  Pharisees  told  them  they  ought  to  have 
practised  mercy  and  judgment,  and  not  to  have 
left  undone  the  payment  of  tithes  of  mint,  anise 
and  cummin,  —  it  was  because  he  did  not  choose 
to  come  to  an  open  rupture  with  the  law,  but 
believed   that  he  had  taught  principles  whicli 
would  in  time  work  its  dissolution  and  destruc- 
tion and  set  man  free  from  its  bondage. 

His  treatment  of  the  Old  Testament  as  com- 
posing the  sacred  writings  of  his  nation  is  like- 


36  SALVATION. 

V, 

wise  remarkable,  and  in  striking  contrast  to  that 
of  his  contemporaries,  as  Philo  for  example, 
and  to  that  of  his  followers,  the  evangelists. 
The  allegorizing  of  these  betrays  their  bondage 
to  a  theory  of  the  infallibility  of  those  writings, 
while  he  put  himself  above  them,  modifying  or 
setting  aside  single  prescripts,  asserting  his  au- 
thority as  Son  of  Man  to  judge  for  himself,  to  be 
Lord  over  all  institutions  and  the  slave  of  none, 
and  declaring  as  the  principle  of  his  own  life 
and  the  watchword  of  progress  for  men,  "It  is 
the  spirit  that  quickeneth." 

2.  The  Ethical  Factor. — Although  not  openly, 
yet  really,  setting  aside  the  law,  Jesus  proceeded 
in  his  teaching  from  an  important  point  of  view 
of  the  old  religion,  —  the  moral,  the  practical 
application  of  truth  to  the  life  of  men.  His 
voice  is  the  voice  of  Moses  and  the  Prophets, 
but  it  sounds  a  new  note,  —  the  note  of  a  uni- 
versal human  sympathy.  The  present  life  and 
the  fortune  of  men  in  it  hold  a  prominent  place 
in  his  conception  of  salvation.  One  looks  in 
vain  through  his  teachings  for  traces  of  that 
eager,  nervous  solicitude  about  the  destiny  of 
the  soul  in  another  life  which  has  unhappily 
given  to  the  popular  Christian  idea  of  salvation 


SALVATION.  37 

# 

II  too  decided  tone  of  self-interest.     That  man 
should  have  his  daily  bread,  be  not  led   iuto 
temptation,  be     delivered    from    evil,  —  these 
were  chief  desiderata,  aims  of  prayer  and  work. 
Morality  is  with  him  no  trivial,  secondary  con- 
cern, to  be  put  aside  in  the  hasty  pursuit  of 
a  religion  valued  more  for  its  ulterior  advan- 
tages than   for  its  help  in  the  present   stress. 
Rather   is   it   the   foundation   of  his   teaching. 
From  the  prominent  place  which  morality  holds 
in  his  teaching  it  would  appear  that  its  incul- 
cation, the  putting  of  it  on  the  right  ground, 
was   thought   by  him   to   be  a  very  important 
part  of  his  mission.     It  was  to  the  reform  of 
the  popular  morality  that  he  addressed  himself 
with  relentless  energy  from  the  beginning  of  his 
mission  to   its  close.      Against    the    hypocrisy, 
narrowness,  and   hatred,  the    half-heartedness, 
conceit,  and  cruelty  of   the  dominant  parties  in 
Jewish  life,  he  shot  his  sharpest  words  of  re- 
proof   and  correction.     He  could  hardly  have 
expressed    himself    in   more   decided    and    un- 
mistakable terms,  had  he  declared  that  he  rec- 
ognized no  salvation  which  was  not  conditioned 
upon  the  recognition  and  practice  of  morality. 
He  never  disparaged  this  life.    On  the  contrary, 


38  SALVATION. 

it  appears  to  have  been  the  underlying  presump- 
tion of  his  teaching  that  the  chief  thing  for 
men  to  do  is  to  set  themselves  right  with  refer- 
ence to  their  daily  duties  and  relations  towards 
one  another.  To  set  themselves  right,  —  this 
was  fundamental  in  the  morality  of  Jesus,  for 
in  it  everything  depends  on  the  disposition. 
Truthful,  clean,  and  pure  this  must  be,  as  the 
condition  of  a  right  life  ;  and  all  external  actions 
find  their  worth  determined  by  reference  to  this 
inward  standard.  Those  who  "  draw  near  with 
their  mouth  and  honor  God  with  their  lips" 
he  denounces  as  hypocrites,  after  the  manner  of 
the  Prophets.^  Treasures  should  be  laid  up  in 
heaven,  because  it  is  important  that  the  heart, 
which  follows  the  treasure,  be  in  the  right 
place.2  Now,  that  right  place  can  be  one  place 
only.  An  undivided  heart  is  essential  to  a 
right  moral  life.  Hence  it  is  impossible  to 
serve  God  and  mammon.  Singleness  of  heart, 
unity  of  aim,  are  indispensable  moral  requisites. 
If  the  eye  be  single,  the  whole  body  shall  be 
full  of  light.^  Unless  the  aim  be  undivided, 
the  life  has  no  promise  of  strength  or  victory. 
One  must  die  to  one's  lower  life,  if  one  will 
1  Matthew  xv.  7,  8.  2  iXyi^,  vi.  19.        ^  ibid.  vi.  22. 


SALVATION.  39 

truly  live,  —  "  he  that  loseth  his  life  for  my  sake 
shall  find  it." 

From  this  universal  ethical  point  of  view  a 
multitude  of  particular  and  minute  directions 
for  conduct  is  not  to  be  looked  for.  A  new  era 
in  morals  has  begun,  and  the  life  of  man  is 
liberated  from  the  hard  restraint  of  arbitrary 
rules  and  left  to  its  free  development  from 
the  inward  source  of  right  belief  and  feeling. 
"  Those  who  stood  watching  the  career  of  Jesus 
felt  that  his  teaching,  but  probably  still  more 
his  deeds,  were  creating  a  revolution  in  mo- 
rality, and  were  setting  to  all  previous  legisla- 
tions. Mosaic  or  Gentile,  that  seal  which  is  at 
once  ratification  and  abolition.  While  they 
watched,  they  felt  the  rules  and  maxims  by 
which  they  had  hitherto  lived  die  into  a  higher 
and  larger  life.  They  felt  the  freedom  which 
is  gained  by  destroying  selfishness  instead  of 
restraining  it,  by  crucifying  the  flesh  instead 
of  circumcising  it.  .  .  .  It  no  longer  seemed 
to  them  necessary  to  prohibit  in  detail  and 
with  laborious  enumeration  the  different  acts 
b}^  which  a  man  may  injure  his  neighbor.  Now 
that  they  had  at  heart  as  the  first  of  interests 
the  happiness  of  all  with  whom  they  might  be 


40  SALVATION. 

brought  into  contact,  they  no  longer  required 
a  law,  for  they  had  acquired  a  quick  and  sen- 
sitive instinct,  which  restrained  them  from  do- 
ing harm.  But  while  the  new  morality  incor- 
porated into  itself  the  old,  how  much  ampler 
was  its  compass !  A  new  continent  in  the 
moral  globe  was  discovered.  Positive  morality 
took  its  place  b}^  the  side  of  Negative.  To  the 
duty  of  not  doing  harm,  which  may  be  called 
Justice,  was  added  the  duty  of  doing  good, 
which  may  properly  receive  the  distinctively 
Christian  name  of  Charity.  And  this  is  the 
meaning  of  that  prediction  which  certain  shep- 
herds reported  to  have  come  to  them  in  a  mys- 
tic song,  heard  under  the  open  sky  of  night, 
proclaiming  the  commencement  of  an  era  of 
'-good  will  to  men.'^'^ 

The  sum  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus  respecting 
the  ethical  salvation  of  men  is  expressed  in  the 
celebrated  principle  which  he  declares  contains 
all  the  law  and  the  Prophets :  *'  Whatsoever 
ye  would  that  men  should  do  to  you,  do  ye 
even  so  to  them  ;  "  which  is  of  the  same  im- 
port as  the  direction  to  love  one's  neighbor  as 
one's  self.  "  Men  "  and  *'  neighbor  "  having  re- 
1  Ecce  Homo,  Boston,  1878,  pp.  204,  205. 


SALVATION.  41 

ceived  a  universal  application  in  the  interpreta- 
tion of  Jesus,  the  limits  of  race  and  social  con- 
dition are  removed,  and  the  world  is  opened  to 
the  sympathy  and  interest  of  each  individual. 
Since  love  cannot  be  commanded,  freedom  be- 
ing essential  to  its  existence,  these  words  should 
be  regarded  as  expressing  the  universal  ethical 
principle  of  man's  development,  in  accordance 
with  which  he  can  alone  find  his  true  life,  his 
salvation  from  moral  evil.  The  central  ethical 
principle  of  Jesus,  that  the  disposition  is  the 
all-important  factor  in  conduct,  finds  also  here 
its  application.  For  if  this  precept  be  in- 
terpreted by  his  spirit  and  example,  its  true 
meaning  will  be  seen  to  be  nothing  short  of  an 
inspiration  of  love  and  a  renunciation  of  self, 
from  which  follows  such  a  consecrated  service 
of  man  as  distinguished  him  whose  life  is  ex- 
pressed in  the  simple  words,  ''  He  went  about 
doing  good." 

In  the  moral  teaching  of  Jesus  the  love  of 
wealth  and  the  striving  for  its  accumulation  are 
disapproved  as  endangering  the  higher  life.  Not 
to  mention  the  woe  pronounced  upon  the  rich,^ 
it  is  declared  to  be  ''the  deceitfulness  of  riches" 
1  Luke  vi.  24. 


42  SALVATION. 

which  choked  the  seed  that  fell  among  thorns 
and  made  it  unfruitful.^  The  love  of  riches 
makes  one  who  was  inclined  to  follow  the  di- 
vine call  turn  back,^  and  makes  another  regard- 
less of  spiritual  interests.^  The  service  of  mam- 
mon is  said  to  be  incompatible  with  that  of  God. 
Indeed,  the  claims  of  the  kingdom  of  God  are 
supreme,  the  ideal  is  high,  and  all  lower  rela- 
tions and  interests  must  yield  to  that  which 
men  are  enjoined  to  "  seek  first."  He  that 
putteth  his  hand  to  the  plough  and  looketh 
back  is  not  fit  for  this  kingdom  of  Renuncia- 
tion. Love  for  relatives,  the  burying  of  the 
dead,  wedding  joys,  —  none  of  these  must  be 
suffered  to  detain  him  whom  truth  and  duty 
call  to  this  kingdom  of  Consecration.  Let  the 
dead  bury  the  dead  !  If  an  eye  or  hand  offend, 
pluck  out,  cut  off!  See  that  thou  enter  into 
life,  though  maimed  and  naked ! 

The  ethical  doctrine  that  the  doing  of  one's 
duty  is  ample  reward,  that  the  good  should  not 
be  pursued  for  the  sake  of  profit  or  pleasure, 
is  decidedly  taught  by  Jesus.  The  reward 
of  service,  be  it  great  or  small,  is  a  free  gift, 

1  Matthew  xili.  22.  ^  Hjid.  xix.  21-26. 

8  Luke  xii.  16-20. 


SALVATION.  43 

whether  the  lord  of  the  vineyard  bestow  much 
or  little.^  One  should  lend  without  hope  of 
receiving  anything  in  return.  He  wlio  has 
wrought  well,  has  at  the  best  done  no  more 
than  his  duty,  and  may  still  expect  not  to 
regale  himself,  but  to  serve  his  master  at  sup- 
per, receiving  no  thanks  for  having  borne  the 
burden  and  heat  of  the  day.^  Whatever  power 
of  salvation  resides  in  morality  must,  indeed, 
express  itself  according  to  this  principle,  since 
on  no  other  does  conduct  have  any  quality  of 
spiritual  life,  or  even,  according  to  Kant,  any 
moral  quality. 

The  moral  fruitfulness  in  the  life,  the  ethi- 
cally saving  power  of  interest  in  the  spiritual 
welfare  of  those  who  by  reason  of  weakness 
have  need  of  kindly  consideration,  is  a  fact  to 
which  many  a  noble  and  tender  character  has 
borne  witness.  Jesus,  himself  a  fine  illustration 
of  this  spirit,  enjoined  it  in  words  of  great 
pathos  and  force.  The  abstaining  from  offend- 
ing the  "little  ones,"  the  "cup  of  cold  water" 
borne  to  them,  have  been  set  forth  in  simple 
and  tender  words  which  will  be  spoken  of 
wherever  the  Gospel  shall  be  preached.     "  You 

1  Matthew  xx.  1-16  ;  vi.  35.  2  L^^e  xvii.  7-10. 


44  SALVATION. 

cannot  step  my  journey  for  me,  cannot  carry 
me  on  your  back,  cannot  do  me  any  great  ser- 
vice ;  but  it  makes  a  world  of  difference  to  me 
whether  I  do  my  part  in  the  world  with  or 
without  these  little  helps  which  fellow-travellers 
can  exchange."  ^  It  makes  a  world  of  differ- 
ence to  us,  too,  whether  we  tender  the  cup  of 
cold  water,  and,  if  need  be,  stoop  to  bind  up  the 
fellow-traveller's  wounds,  or  pass  by  on  the 
other  side.  Better  for  us  were  it,  if  we  are 
recreant  to  this  duty,  that  a  millstone  be  hanged 
about  our  neck  and  we  be  cast  into  the  sea. 
The  fortune  of  those  who  keep  this  great  ethical 
law  is  not  more  blessed  than  is  the  judgment  of 
those  dreadful  who  break  it. 

3.  The  Religious  Factor.  —  Important,  how- 
ever, as  is  the  ethical  factor  in  salvation,  Jesus 
did  not  leave  the  deliverance  of  men  from  sin 
dependent  on  this  alone.  He  had  a  too  sure 
insight,  knew  too  well  what  was  in  man,  not  to 
discern  the  human  need  of  a  higher  strength 
and  support  in  the  stress  of  temptation  than 
are  furnished  in  man's  moral  intuitions  and 
sentiments,  — the  need  of  trust,  faith,  and  hope 
in  a  Divine  Providence,  —  in  a  word,  the  need  of 

1  W.  C.  Gannett. 


SALVATION.  45 

Religion.  At  the  centre  of  his  teaching  of 
religion  is  the  idea  of  God  as  the  Father  of  men. 
With  him  ttfis  is  not,  first  of  all,  a  doctrine.  It 
is  rather  chiefly  the  expression  of  his  profound- 
est  feeling  and  belief,  of  his  religious  conscious- 
ness. He  felt  himself  to  be  the  Son  of  God, 
in  a  unique  spiritual  relation,  but  no  less  on 
this  account  the  Son  of  man.  His  model  prayer 
he  taught  to  his  disciples,  instructing  them  to 
address  his  Father  in  heaven  as  theirs.  Proof 
for  the  existence  of  the  Father  he  seems  never 
to  have  thought  of  asking  for  himself,  much 
less  of  giving  to  others.  The  intimate  relations 
of  human  fatherhood  —  its  love,  interest,  help- 
fulness—  are  to  him  the  earthly  type  of  the  rela- 
tion of  God  to  men,  —  the  fatherhood  which 
will  not  give  a  stone  when  asked  for  bread,  and 
will  extend  open  arms  of  welcome  to  the  peni- 
tent prodigal,  though  returning  in  misery  and 
squalor.  There  remains  now  no  limitation  of 
race.  It  is  not  the  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and 
Jacob  to  whom  Jesus  directs  men,  but  the 
Universal  Father.  If  some  are  the  children 
of  the  evil  one,  it  is  because  of  their  spiritual 
kinship ;  essentially  they  are  the  children  of 
God,  as  He  would  have  them  spiritually  be- 


46  SALVATION. 

come.  Practical  in  the  highest  degree  and  of 
saving  efficacy  does  this  doctrine  become  in  his 
application  of  it  to  men.  As  children  of  God 
they  are  enjoined  to  be  perfect  as  He  is  perfect, 
to  strive  after  godlikeness,  to  bless  those  who 
curse  them,  to  love  their  enemies  that  they  may 
be  like  their  Father  in  heaven,  who  maketh  His 
sun  to  shine  on  the  evil  and  on  the  good,  and 
sendeth  rain  on  the  just  and  on  the  unjust.^ 
Thus  does  he  transfigure  morality  into  religion, 
breathing  into  it  the  breath  of  a  new  life,  as- 
piration for  a  divine  fellowship,  and  the  feeling 
which  belongs  to  a  divine  service.  Thus  should 
men  be  exalted  to  the  height  of  religious  con- 
sciousness which  he  himself  occupied,  —  the 
consciousness  of  being  children  of  God.  So 
high  a  religious  conception  as  this  has  never 
been  attained  by  any  other  teacher,  —  a  concep- 
tion showing  so  deep  an  insight  into  the  spirit- 
ual capacities  and  needs  of  man,  and  making  a 
provision  so  simple  and  so  adequate  for  his 
salvation. 

That  one  so  pure  as  was  Jesus,  living  in  such 
high  converse  of  spiritual  fellowship  with  God, 
should  have  a  keen  sense  of  sin  and  its  dread- 
i  Matthew  v.  44-48. 


SALVATION.  47 

fill  consequences  in  the  life  of  man,  goes  with- 
out saying.  His  conception  of  his  mission,  his 
consecration  and  sacrifice,  find  their  interpre- 
tation in  this.  Dull  of  spiritual  discernment, 
hard  of  heart,  having  ears  and  hearing  not, 
obdurate  and  blind,  he  finds  men  to  be,  not  by- 
reason  of  original  depravity,  but  of  their  own 
choice.  As  free  and  capable  of  accepting  the 
truth  and  choosing  the  divine  life,  does  he  al- 
ways address  them,  with  an  appeal  to  con- 
science and  the  better  impulses.  As  estranged 
from  God  and  in  darkness,  he  appeals  to  them 
to  return  to  their  allegiance  and  to  the  light. 
The  Father  is  ready  to  welcome  them.  Heaven 
is  moved  to  joy  at  their  coming.  They  are 
even  sought  with  unwearied  solicitude.  The 
shepherd  is  not  at  peace,  with  his  ninety  and 
nine  safely  sheltered,  so  long  as  one  wanders 
lost.  It  is,  indeed,  these  lost,  bewildered  soul» 
whom  Jesus  himself  came  to  "  seek  and  save." 
The  whole  economy  which  he  represents  is  one 
of  pitying  tenderness,  love,  and  mercy.  Heaven 
bends  benignant  and  full  of  yearning  over  a 
darkened  world,  to  watch  and  support  his  mis- 
sion. One  condition  is,  however,  imposed  upon 
the   impenitent,  —  repentance   (^ixerdvoLo)^  —  a 


48  SALVATION. 

change  of  mind,  disposition,  affections.  To 
call  sinners  to  repentance,  this  Jesus  declares 
to  be  his  mission.^  Sin  must,  indeed,  have  its 
dreadful  course  and  work  its  inevitable  anguish. 
The  wretched  prodigal  must  dwell  with  swine 
in  a  land  seared  by  famine,  must  feel  the  curse 
and  shame  of  his  sinful  life,  until  he  is  moved  to 
confess  that  he  has  sinned  and  is  unworthy  to  be 
called  a  son,  before  the  paternal  clemency  can  be 
extended  to  him.  But  when  the  sinner  has  thus 
set  himself  right  in  relation  to  the  Father  ;  when, 
no  sacrifice  being  required  but  that  of  his  own 
pride  and  evil  passions,  he  has  become  softened 
and  reconciled  through  sorrow  and  suffering,  — 
then  does  forgiveness  rush  forth  to  meet  him, 
and  he  is  welcomed  and  crowned  amidst  great 
rejoicing  as  the  son  who  was  lost  and  is  found. 
What  simplicity,  what  tenderness,  what  deeps 
of  pathos,  are  here  !  How  is  the  great,  hard 
world-order  of  law  softened  with  pity  and 
transfigured  by  the  touch  of  love  ! 

To  seek  the  kingdom  of  God  and  its  right- 
eousness is,  according  to  Jesus,  to  attain  salva- 
tion, —  that  is,  to  enter  into  that  community  of 
devout  souls  which  he  came  to  establish  on  the 
1  Luke  V.  32. 


SALVATION.  49 

earth.  The  required  righteousness  must,  how- 
ever, exceed  that  of  the  scribes  and  Pharisees. 
It  was  not  the  merely  outward  observance  of 
ceremonies,  but  an  inward  likeness  to  God. 
This  righteousness  was  a  new  religious  idea  as 
apprehended  and  taught  by  him,  an  old  principle 
transformed  ;  for  in  it  the  old  separation  of  man 
and  God  is  removed,  and  the  human  soul  re- 
nounces its  will  and  gives  itself  up  in  love  and 
trust  to  the  Father.  They  who  hunger  and 
thirst  after  righteousness  are  among  the  blessed, 
for  they  shall  be  filled.  In  fellowship  with 
God,  in  the  God-consciousness,  as  he  knew  it, 
shall  they  find  peace  and  everlasting  strength. 
Let  them  take  his  soft  yoke  and  easy  burden, 
and  they  shall  have  rest,  not  only  from  weari- 
some ceremony  and  hollow  formalism,  but  also 
from  the  fatal  bondage  of  sin,  and  with  him 
enter  into  liberty  and  life  in  God.  A  light 
yoke  and  an  easy  burden  !  Strange  paradox  I 
Wondrous  invitation  !  This  sorrowful  and  bur- 
dened soul,  this  great  cross-bearer,  invites  men 
to  come  to  him  for  rest  I  Yet  the  resolving  of 
this  paradox  reveals  the  secret  of  salvation  as 
discerned  and  taught  by  Jesus.  In  communion 
with  God,  in  the  sense  of  not  being  alone  be- 


50  SALVATION. 

cause  the  Father  is  with  him,  in  love,  trust,  and 
faith,  in  doing  righteousness  with  singleness  of 
heart,  in  fulfilling  a  divine  mission  although 
uncomprehended  and  abandoned  by  the  world, 
a  man  in  mortal  weakness  and  shaken  by  temp- 
tation finds  an  invincible  strength.  The  yoke 
of  such  a  service  is  soft  to  his  neck;  the  heaviest 
cross,  an  easy  burden. 

This  coming  to  him,  this  prominence  given 
to  his  personality,  is  a  unique  feature  in  Jesus' 
teaching  of  salvation,  —  a  feature  which  places 
his  interpreters  in  the  dilemma  of  either  charg- 
ing him  with  the  most  audacious  assumption, 
or  admitting  that  he  was  profoundly  conscious 
of  holding  to  men  the  relation  of  exhibiting 
an  ideal  type  of  life,  in  the  appropriation  of 
which  salvation  was  pre-eminently,  if  not  alone, 
to  be  found.  The  everlasting  or  eternal  life, 
the  idea  of  which  is  central  in  his  conception 
of  the  saving  of  men  from  sin,  he  represents 
as  manifested  in  himself,  as  to  be  communicated 
to  the  world  through  his  personality.  This 
divine  life-principle,  by  which  the  earthly  ex- 
istence of  man  is  transfigured  and  glorified,  the 
life  in  faith  and  love  and  spiritual  striving,  is 
to   be  attained   by   belief  in   him.     "He  that 


SALVATION.  .51 

believeth  on  the  Son  hath  everlasting  life,"  is 
a  great  saying  which  no  magical  interpretation 
can  exhaust ;  but  it  must  be  understood  in  the 
light  of  the  declaration  that  it  hath  been  given 
to  the  Son  to  have  life  in  himself  as  the 
Father  hath  it  in  Himself.  To  acquire  eternal 
life  by  faith  in  Jesus  is,  accordingly,  to  believe 
in  his  life  of  consecration,  obedience,  worship, 
and  love,  and  make  it  one's  own.  The  sim- 
plicity and  directness  of  the  process  of  salva- 
tion as  thus  taught  by  Jesus,  compared  with  the 
complicated  "  plan  of  salvation  "  as  set  forth 
in  Christian  theology,  call  to  mind  Lessing's  dis- 
tinction between  the  Christian  religion  and  the 
religion  of  Christ.^ 

By  the  life  of  Jesus,  however,  by  the  power 
of  his  personality  as  manifesting  truth,  are  men 
to  be  saved,  according  to  his  teaching,  and  not 
by  means  of  his  death.  To  come  to  him,  to 
follow  him,  to  keep  the  commandments,  to 
renounce  earthly  possessions,  to  seek  the  king- 
dom of  God,  —  these  things  must  he  do  who 
would  have  eternal  life.  In  his  Sermon  on 
the  Mount,   in  his  discourses   generally  before 

1  "  Lessing's  Theological  Opinions/'  Universalist  Quarterly, 
April,  1881. 


52  SALVATION. 

his  departure  from  Csesarea  Philippi  for  Judsea, 
there  are  no  allusions  to  a  connection  between 
his  death  and  his  work  as  Saviour ;  and  nowhere 
do  we  find  him  teaching  that  belief  in  his  death 
or  in  any  effects  to  be  wrought  b}^  his  death 
has  a  saving  efficacy.  One  passage,  however, 
presents  some  difficulty,  and  a  difference  of 
opinion  has  arisen  in  its  interpretation.  In 
Matthew  xx.  28,  Jesus  says  that  he  "  came  not 
to  be  ministered  unto,  but  to  minister,  and  to 
give  his  life  a  ransom  for  many,''''  But  there  is 
here  no  mention  of  faith  in  his  death,  nor  of 
any  subjective  appropriation  of  it  as  a  means 
of  salvation.  To  his  death  are,  indeed,  ascribed 
the  meaning  and  effect  of  a  ransom,  —  for  as 
implying  his  death,  we  ought  probably  to  in- 
terpret the  words  "  to  give  his  life."  The  inter- 
pretation hinges  on  the  meaning  which  belongs 
to  "  ransom."  •  The  original  meaning  is  "  price 
for  redeeming ; "  and  if  it  is  to  be  taken  strictly 
in  that  sense,  here  it  can  only  mean  that  one 
life,  that  of  Jesus,  was  given  and  accepted  in 
the  place  of  the  lives  of  many,  that  is,  to  save 
them  from  death.  But  the  connection,  as  well 
as  the  whole  analogy  of  his  teaching,  appears 
to  require  the  interpretation  that  his  death,  like 


SALVATION.  53 

his  life,  is  to  be  regarded  as  saving,  delivering, 
setting  free  morally  and  spiritually  from  bond- 
asre  to  sin.  That  the  connection  favors  the 
ethical  and  not  the  legalistic  interpretation,  is 
evident  from  this,  that  there  the  ministering 
quality,  the  service,  of  his  life  is  made  the  cen- 
tral idea  of  his  mission.  It  is  in  this  way  that 
he  releases,  or  ransoms,  men.  His  death,  the 
crowning  act  of  this  service,  is  just  such  a 
Xvrpov,  or  ''  ransom."  ^ 

1  Winer  and  Meyer,  the  highest  grammatical  authorities,  lay 
stress  upon  the  preposition  duri,  which,  as  here  used,  means 
"  instead  of ;  "  and  the  latter  maintains  that  substitution  is  ex- 
pressed by  it  here.  Baur  takes  this  view  also,  and  regards  the 
words  as  not  spoken  by  Jesus,  so  strongly  does  he  think  them 
opposed  to  the  analogy  of  the  teaching  of  the  Gospels.  On 
the  contrary,  De  Wette  says  that  "  ransom  "  is  not  to  be  taken 
as  indicating  an  exchange,  but  dynamically  as  marking  an 
effect.  The  passage  is  no  doubt  diflBcult,  and  grammar  ap- 
pears to  come  into  conflict  with  analogy  of  teaching  in  its 
interpretation.  But  the  question  may  fairly  be  raised  whether 
or  no  it  is  not  hypergrammatical  to  attempt,  as  Meyer  does,  to 
establish  a  doctrine  upon  a  single  preposition  in  writings  com- 
posed as  the  Gospels  were,  and  having  had  such  a  fortune  as 
they  have  had  in  the  hands  of  copyists,  —  more  especially 
wlien  the  words  in  question  were  undoubtedly  spoken  in  an- 
other language  than  that  in  which  they  were  written  down  in 
the  record.  In  this  case  one  will  surely  not  be  accused  of 
hermeneutical  violence  in  making  the  preposition  yield  to  the 
analogy. 


54  SALVATION. 

III.  —  The  Pauline  Doctrine. 

Jesus  died  upon  the  cross ;  but  the  greatest 
of  his  followers  saw  in  that  instrument  of  tor- 
ture the  glorified  central  figure  in  a  universal 
plan  of  salvation,  and  gave  it  a  unique  interpre- 
tation for  the  ages.  Saul  of  Tarsus,  reared  in 
the  traditions  of  Judaism  and  accordincr  to  the 
tenets  of  the  strictest  of  its  sects,  learned  in 
Rabbinical  lore,  a  student  of  the  law  and  the 
Prophets,  a  zealot  in  his  religion,  a  persecutor 
of  the  Christians,  was  suddenly  converted  to 
the  religion  of  Jesus  while  on  his  way  to  Da- 
mascus as  its  most  dreaded  enemy.  Upon  the 
details  of  this  conversion  it  is  not  necessary 
here  to  enter,  nor  to  discuss  its  probable  prepara- 
tions and  antecedents.  It  is  enough  that  Saul, 
the  persecutor  of  Christianit}^,  became  Paul,  its 
greatest  apostle;  for  as  an  apostle,  or  one  sent, 
he  regarded  himself  from  the  eventful  hour  of 
his  conver.sion.  From  that  hour  he  gloried  in 
the  cross,  which  before  he  had  looked  upon 
as  the  detestable  symbol  of  a  noxious  fanati- 
cism. Now  rather  did  it  have  for  him  a  world- 
historical  significance,  and  stand  for  the  breaking 
down  of  partition  walls  of  Judaistic   national 


SALVATION.  55 

exclusiveness,  for  the  abolishing  of  distinctions 
of  race  and  sect  in  relation  to  the  Divine  favor, 
for  the  universal  offer  of  the  Divine  grace  to 
men,  and  for  universal  liberty  and  salvation. 
Although  it  might  be  to  the  Jew  a  stumbling- 
block  and  to  the  Greek  foolishness,  to  this  seer 
it  was  "  the  power  of  God." 

The  great  Apostle  to  the  Gentiles,  properly 
so  called  because  he  apprehended  Christianity 
as  a  universal  principle,  takes  as  the  central 
thought  of  his  Gospel  the  idea  of  Righteous- 
ness, that  "  master-impulse  of  Hebraism."  The 
relation  of  man  to  God — or,  in  other  words,  relig- 
ion —  he  brings  under  this  conception.  The  fit- 
ness, the  rightness,  in  this  relation  ;  conformity 
to  God's  will ;  ''  harmony  with  the  universal 
order ; "  the  state  of  mind  which  God  will  have 
in  men, —  are  all  expressed  by  this  great  word. 
To  him  the  task  of  religion  is  to  bring  men  into 
this  relation,  and  its  great  problem  is  how  to 
do  it.  Now,  if  he  had  been  dealing  with  religion 
in  general,  it  is  evident  that  his  discussion  of 
the  question  would  have  taken  a  very  wide 
range,  and  we  should  not  have  had  what  ma}' 
very  properly  be  called  his  distinctive  contribu- 
tions to  religion,  or  what  he  calls  his  ''  Gospel." 


56  SALVATION. 

It  is,  however,  as  a  Christian  that  he  approaches 
the  problem,  and  as  a  Christian  it  is  that  with 
masterly  insight  he  seizes  upon  the  personal  fac- 
tor which,  as  we  have  seen,  Jesus  made  so  con- 
spicuous. For  him  righteousness  is  no  mere 
abstraction.  It  has  had  once  for  all,  for  all 
ages  and  for  all  men,  a  perfect  embodiment  and 
manifestation.  It  has  been  lived ;  and  in  the 
life  which  had  revealed  it  he  sees  the  whole 
meaning  which  Christianity  has  for  him,  his 
sole  hope  for  personal  deliverance  from  sin  and  a 
universal  principle  and  power  for  the  salvation 
of  the  world.  Of  his  own  spiritual  trans- 
formation, or  conversion,  he  says  it  is  a  revela- 
tion of  the  Son  of  God  in  him  which  it  has 
pleased  God  to  make.^  Hereby  has  come  into 
his  life  and  into  that  of  every  Christian  a  new 
religious  consciousness,  in  which  there  are  no 
more  the  bondage  and  limitations  of  Judaism, 
but  liberty  and  a  spiritual  principle  victorious 
over  the  flesh. '  The  spirit  (irvev^ia)  it  is  which 
the  Christian  has  received,  and  whereby  he  is 
distinguished  from  what  he  was  before,  whether 
Jew  or  Gentile.  They  who  receive  Christ  into 
their  life  by  faith  receive  this  spirit ;  for  he,  the 
1  Galatians  i.  15,  16. 


SALVATION.  57 

Lord,  is  spirit,^  and  where  the  spirit  of  the  Lord 
is,  there  is  liberty.  No  longer  now  is  their  sal- 
vation dependent  on  aught  external,  but  it  is 
conditioned  on  fellowship  and  union  with  God. 
In  receiving  the  Son,  they  themselves  become 
sons  of  God ;  for  this  spirit  which  they  have 
liad  revealed  in  them,  this  Chrisf-principle,  is 
the  spirit  of  adoption  whereby  they  cry,  "  Abba, 
Father." 

The  absolute  necessity  of  the  mediation  of 
Christ  in  man's  attainment  of  righteousness,  in 
his  justification  or  salvation,  is  the  great  thesis 
of  the  Pauline  soteriology.  Of  the  two  kinds 
of  righteousness  which  the  Apostle  recognizes, 
that  of  *^  works"  and  that  of  ''faith,"  the 
former  is  declared  to  be  unattainable.  This  is 
legal  righteousness,  or  righteousness  under  the 
law,  which,  so  far  as  Jews  were  concerned, 
could  be  attained  only  by  fulfilling  the  Mosaic 
law,  and  so  far  as  the  heathen  were  concerned, 
by  following  the  law  "  written  in  their  hearts." 
It  is  the  righteousness  of  obedience,  of  entire 
fulfilment  of  the  law,  whereby  alone  from  this 
point  of  view  man  can  come  into  the  required 
relation  to  God.      That  man  cannot  fulfil  the 

^  2  Corinthians  iii.  17. 


58  SALVATION. 

law,  and  hence  can  never  compass  the  righ- 
teousness which  is  of  works,  is  the  fundamental 
proposition  of  Paul  for  this  negative  side  of  his 
doctrine  of  salvation.  His  own  profound  con- 
sciousness of  sin  should  doubtless  not  be  left 
out  of  account  in  appreciating  his  judguient  on 
this  point.  But  why  is  the  law  thus  ineffectual  ? 
It  is  through  the  law  that  the  consciousness  of 
sin  comes  :  "  the  law  is  spiritual ;  "  it  is  "  holy, 
right,  and  good."  ^  How,  then,  is  that  whose 
"  design  was  life  "  found  to  ''  issue  in  death  "  ? 
The  answer  to  this  is  found  in  Paul's  concep- 
tion of  the  "  flesh,"  —  a  term  by  which  he 
designates  not  the  body  only,  but  the  sensuous, 
earthly  nature  of  man,  which  is  prone  to  sin,  — 
in  a  word,  all  that  is  opposed  to  the  "  spirit."  It 
is  the  seat  and  organ  of  sin.  In  this  lies  the 
reason  of  the  inability  of  the  law  to  "make 
alive."  It  is  "  weak  through  the  flesh."  ^  The 
imperative  of  the  law,  its  high  ideal,  its  convic- 
tion of  sin,  are  ineffectual  against  this  fatal 
power,  this  fleshliness,  this  tendency  to  sin. 
But  is  there  not  "  the  law  of  the  mind,"  or 
reason,  ''  the  inner  man,"  to  contend  against  the 
flesh?    The  fact  that  the  Apostle  recognizes  this 

1  Romans  vii.  7-17.  2  md.^  yjii.  3. 


SALVATION.  59 

principle  in  the  unre^enerate  man,  this  mind 
which  *'  delights  in  the  law  of  God,"  shows 
how  far  he  was  from  the  Augustinian  point  of 
view  in  his  anthropology,  —  from  the  doctrine  of 
the  fall  of  man  and  hereditary  depravity.  Yet 
the  "  mind  "  is  unable  with  the  law  and  with 
experience  to  prevail  against  the  flesh  ;  and  the 
"  wretched  man,"  after  all  his  ineffectual  strug- 
gle, at  the  end  of  the  pathetic  conflict  is  brought 
"  into  captivity  to  the  law  of  sin." 

Here,  ^'om  the  Apostle's  point  of  view,  would 
man  be  left,  weak,  defeated,  hopeless,  were  it 
not  for  Christ,  who  alone  could  redeem  him  ;  or 
rather,  were  it  not  for  the  grace  of  God  in 
Christ.  ''  For  what  the  law  could  not  do,"  what 
the  *'  inner  man,"  or  the  reason,  "  the  law  of  the 
mind,"  was  unable  to  do  in  its  endless  and  in- 
effectual struggle  with  the  flesh,  "  God  hath 
done,  who  on  account  of  sin  sent  His  own  son 
...  and  passed  sentence  of  condemnation  on 
sin  in  the  flesh ;  so  that  what  is  required  by  the 
law  is  accomplished  in  us  who  walk  not  accord- 
ing to  the  flesh,  but  according  to  the  spirit."  i 
Thus  is  salvation  placed  by  Paul  in  immediate 
dependence  on  the  person  of  Christ,  who  is  a 

1  Romans  viii.  1-4. 


60  SALVATION. 

means  employed  by  the  Father  for  enabling  man 
to  acquire  the  righteousness  which  shall  put 
him  into  relations  of  harmony  and  peace  with 
God.  The  old  order  has  passed  away.  The 
law  is  abrogated  in  the  sense  that  its  require- 
ments possess  a  power  to  effect  righteousness. 
Man  cannot  be  justified  by  the  works  of  the 
law,  because  tvithout  Christ  he  is  unable  to 
render  a  perfect  obedience.  We  have  not,  how- 
ever, here  an  artificial  scheme,  nor  a  scheme  of 
salvation  by  magic,  nor  yet  the  Augustinian  one 
of  "  satisfaction."  Paul  does  not  degrade  Christ 
to  the  place  of  a  victim  sacrificed  to  appease  the 
wrath  of  God.  It  is  contrary  to  the  whole 
temper  of  the  Apostle's  mind  and  the  whole  tone 
of  his  teaching,  that  a  man  should  come  to  so 
great  a  fortune  as  that  of  righteousness  through 
the  fiction  of  appropriating  the  merits  of  Christ. 
To  manifest  the  righteousness  of  God  is  the 
death  of  His  Son  set  forth,  and  the  "  propitia- 
tion "  is  a  mere  reference  to  Jewish  ceremonial, 
and  must  not  be  pressed,  since  it  has  no  vital 
connection  with  PauFs  real  doctrine  of  salvation. 
So  precious  an  offering  as  this  blameless  life, 
and  nothing  less  than  this,  is,  indeed,  well 
adapted    to    manifest   the  Divine    sense  of  the 


SALVATION.  61 

enormity  of  sin,  against  which  the  Divine  righ- 
teousness is  relieved  in  glaring  contrast.  But 
to  Paul  the  death  of  Christ  had  its  chief  signifi- 
cance for  men.  Upon  them  was  its  effect.  The 
great  Martyr  on  the  cross  turned  his  face,  dis- 
torted with  agony,  not  towards  the  unrelenting 
heavens  to  affect  the  Deity,  but  upon  the  earth 
for  the  sake  of  men.  Accordingly,  Paul  declares 
that  "  God  was  in  Christ,  reconciling  the  world 
unto  Himself."  That  God  needed  to  be  recon- 
ciled to  men,  seems  never  to  have  entered  his 
mind.  In  his  death,  the  destruction  of  his  flesh, 
Christ  is  manifested  to  Paul  as  spirit  and  as  spir- 
itualizing. Now  that  he  has  passed  through  the 
great  transformation  and  even  the  great  victory, 
he  is  no  longer  to  Paul  the  material,  temporal, 
limited  Messiah  of  the  Jews,  but  a  universal 
spiritual  and  quickening  power.  If  he  has  ever 
known  Clirist  after  the  flesh,  he  says,  he  now  so 
knows  him  no  longer,  since  he  has  died  for  all ; 
nor  will  he  henceforth  know  any  man  after  the 
flesh,  since,  Christ  having  died  for  all,  all  have 
died,  their  death  to  the  flesh  being  included  in 
his  dying  on  their  behalf.^  Here,  indeed,  we 
have  a  "  substitution,"  and  the  only  substitution 

1  2  Corinthians  v.  14-15. 


62  SALVATION. 

which  Paul  knows.  Christ,  dying  on  behalf  of 
all,  t3^pifies  in  his  death  the  death  of  all  men  to 
the  flesh  and  to  sin,  '*  that  they  should  no 
longer  live  to  themselves,  but  to  him  who  died 
for  their  sakes." 

As  a  representative  of  the  race,  then,  it  is 
that,  in  Paul's  view,  Christ  in  his  life  and  in 
his  death  stands  forth ;  yet  not  as  a  representa- 
tive of  the  race  only,  but  as  one  who  loved  all 
men  and  would  bring  them  all  to  his  own  spirit- 
ual attainment.  In  his  life  he  had  been  a  per- 
fect manifestation  of  "  the  righteousness  of  God," 
and  thus  an  ideal  set  up  for  men  and  a  quicken- 
ing spirit.  In  his  death  all  men  died  to  sin,  and 
the  world  was  ideally  reconciled  to  God ;  that 
is,  men  assumed  such  a  relation  to  Him  as  to  be 
proper  subjects  of  the  forgiveness  which  He  was 
always  ready  to  grant.  No  longer  does  the  law 
overshadow  them  with  its  antique  and  awful  as- 
pect of  bondage.  Christ  has  rendered  it  a  perfect 
fulfilment,  being  without  sin.  "  The  handwrit- 
ing of  ordinances  that  was  against  us  "  he  has 
'-'  nailed  to  the  cross,"  and  now  the  level  way  of 
salvation  lies  open  to  men  through  participation 
in  the  life  and  power  of  his  triumphant  spirit. 

One  factor  is  yet,  however,  wanting  to  effect 


SALVATION.  63 

the  great  work  of  men's  salvation  through  Christ. 
The  righteousness  to  be  attained  is  that  through 
faith.  This  faith,  as  Paul  apprehends  it,  is  as 
far  as  possible  removed  from  magic  and  mystery. 
It  does  not  effect  a  transfer  of  the  "  merits  "  of 
Christ  to  man.  It  is  belief  in  the  whole  manifes- 
tation by  Christ  of  the  liigher  life,  of  the  spirit, 
—  belief  in  his  death  and  resurrection.  They 
who  believe  in  Christ  are  one  with  him ;  with 
him  they  have  died,  having  crucified  the  flesh, 
and  with  him  have  they  risen  to  newness  of  life. 
"  Faith  is  the  bond,"  says  a  great  interpreter  of 
Paul,i  "  of  a  fellowship  of  life  with  Christ,  in 
which  Christ  so  lives  in  us  that  all  which  in  us 
is  only  limited,  only  belongs  to  our  selfish  ego, 
is  removed,  and  we  no  longer  live  to  ourselves, 
but  in  him."  In  the  same  vein  writes  one  of 
the  acutest  literary  interpreters  of  the  Apostle  :  ^ 
"  Identifying  ourselves  with  Christ  through  this 
attachment  [of  faith],  we  become  as  lie  was  ;  we 
live  with  his  tlioughts  and  feelings,  and  we  par- 
ticipate, therefore,  in  his  freedom  from  the  ruin- 
ous law  in  our  members,  in  his  obedience  to 
the  saving  law  of  the  spirit,  in  his  conformity  to 
the  eternal  order,  in  the  joy  and  peace  of  his 

1  F.  C.  Baur.  2  Matthew  Arnold. 


64:  SALVATION. 

life  in  God."  Faith  does  not,  however,  effect 
this  consummation  alone.  It  "  works  by  love," 
by  recognition  of  and  response  to  that  divine 
principle  to  which  was  due  the  sending  of  Christ, 
and  his  own  offering  up  of  himself  for  men. 
Without  this,  faith  could  not  bring  about  that 
entire  union  with  Christ  in  which  we  partici- 
pate in  his  self-sacrificing  spirit,  die  with  him  to 
the  selfish  lusts  of  the  flesh,  and  have  a  share 
also  in  his  victory. 

Is  there,  then,  no  place  for  works,  for  the  law, 
for  morality  in  this  scheme  of  the  Apostle  ?  Far 
be  it !  They  who  so  apprehend  him  as  to  an- 
swer this  question  in  the  affirmative  do  not  know 
his  profundity,  his  practical  sense.  They  forget 
that  he  was  of  the  Hebrew  stock,  pre-eminent 
in  its  genius  for  righteousness.  They  suppose 
him  to  have  mistaken  entirely  the  practical 
morality  of  Jesus,  to  have  misconceived  the 
whole  spirit  and  method  of  bis  Master.  This 
polemic  against  the  law,  this  panegyric  of  faith, 
are  but  the  strong  contrasting  of  Judaism  and 
Christianity,  and  do  not  affect,  much  less  invali- 
date, the  conceptions  of  duty,  obedience,  and 
service.  He  did  not  so  misunderstand  the  re- 
ligion of  his  nation  as  to  regard  it  as  altogether 


SALVATION.  (J5 

legalistic  and  external,  as  taking  no  account  of 
the  disposition  and  finding  no  place  for  pardon. 
A  stern  moralist  in  his  judgment  of  himself,  he 
never  loses  sight  of  the  moral  law  and  human 
responsibility.  We  accordingh^  find  him  de- 
claring with  solemn  emphasis  that  God  will 
render  to  every  one  according  to  his  works,  and 
proclaiming  that  tribulation  and  distress  shall 
be  upon  every  soul  whose  works  are  evil.  Works 
and  faith  together  are  the  two  essential  factors 
in  attaining  righteousness.  With  what  unwea- 
ried energy  did  he  spend  himself  in  the  service 
of  his  Master  and  of  men !  To  him  the  union 
of  the  soul  with  Christ  through  faith  was  a 
partaking  of  the  Christ-spirit  of  consecration  to 
toil,  to  the  dungeon,  to  stripes,  or  to  the  cross 
for  the  sake  of  men.  The  righteousness  of  faith 
was  consummated  in  the  righteousness  of  loving 
service  and  all-renouncing  sacrifice. 

IV.  —  The  Doctrine  in  Hebret\^s. 

The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  the  author  of 
which  is  unknown,  presents  the  doctrine  of  sal- 
vation from  a  peculiar  point  of  view.  Whether 
the  writer  was  influenced,  as  some  hold,  by 
the    Alexandrian    philosophy  or    not,    he    un- 


66  SALVATION. 

questionably  held  a  view  of  the  relation  of  Juda- 
ism to  Christianity  quite  different  from  Paul's. 
In  Paul  the  two  are  related  as  letter  and  spirit, 
servitude  and  sonship ;  in  this  writer,  as  pre- 
figuration  and  completion,  as  shadow  and  reality. 
The  Epistle  was  evidently  written  for  Jews, 
with  the  design  of  showing  them  that  Chris- 
tianity was  a  fulfilment  of  things  typified  in 
the  old  religion,  and  of  making  easy  their  transi- 
tion from  the  one  to  the  other.  Interest  in  this 
writing,  so  far  as  it  relates  to  salvation,  centres 
in  its  apprehension  of  the  office  of  Christ, 
which  is  here  treated  under  the  conception  of 
the  priesthood.  Christianity  is  a  completion 
of  the  Jewish  religion,  that  "  shadow  of  things 
to  come,"  in  the  dignity  and  grandeur  of  its 
priestly,  atoning  institution.  A  "  Priest  for- 
ever, after  the  order  of  Melchizedec,"  Christ 
assumed  the  sacrificial  office,  and  "  once  for  all " 
entered  into  the  sanctuary,  and  ''  with  his  own 
blood  obtained  for  us  everlasting  redemption." 
Into  no  sanctuary  made  with  hands,  however, 
did  he  enter,  but  "  into  heaven  itself,  now  to 
appear  in  the  presence  of  God  in  our  behalf." 
Unpauline  as  is  this  transfer  of  the  scene  of 
Christ's  work  from  earth  to  heaven,  there  is  a 


SALVATION.  67 

reminiscence  of  the  doctrine  of  Paul  as  to  the 
reconciling  efficacy  of  Christ's  offering  of  him- 
self in  the  fine  words  :  '*  How  much  more  shall 
the  blood  of  Christ,  who  by  his  everlasting 
spirit  offered  himself  without  spot  to  God, 
purify  your  conscience  from  dead  ivorks^  for  the 
worship  of  the  living  God  !  "  From  the  point 
of  view  of  this  writer  the  work  of  Christ  con- 
sists chiefly  in  consummating  an  atoning  work 
shadowed  forth  in  the  ceremonial  of  the  Old 
Testament.  Depreciated  as  a  "  shadow,"  the 
old  economy  is  exalted  by  the  very  fact  of  its 
prefiguring  function.  The  Epistls  contains  no 
reference  to  the  Pauline  contrast  of  the  rig-h- 
teousness  of  faith  and  of  works,  and  faith  itself 
receives  an  interpretation  quite  different  from 
Paul's  absolute  trust  in  the  saving  grace  of 
God  in  Christ.  Far  from  being  set  forth  as  a 
distinctively  Christian  virtue,  examples  of  its 
exercise  are  drawn  from  Jewish  history  or 
legend.  It  is  declared  to  be  "the  substance  of 
things  hoped  for,  a  conviction  of  things  not 
seen."  Not  as  a  mystic  fellowship  of  the  life 
with  Christ  is  it  taught  or  illustrated,  but 
rather  as  a  holding  fast  to  supersensible  things, 
a  looking  for  that  "  city  which   hath   founda- 


68  SALVATION. 

tions"  whose  builder  and  maker  is  God,  and 
for  that  "  better  and  heavenly  countr3\"  The 
exaltation  of  the  priestly,  atoning  office  of  Christ 
ill  this  Epistle,  and  its  implied  depreciation  of 
the  present  life,  may  suggest  an  inqnir}^  as  to 
the  extent  of  its  influence  in  shaping  a  long 
prevailing  type  of  Christian  theology.  Too 
much,  perhaps,  have  men  interpreted  the  New 
Testament  by  this  work  of  an  unknown  author 
which  did  not  even  find  a  place  in  the  Canon 
without  decided  opposition. 

V.  —  Salvation  and  Science. 

Mr.  Huxley,  in  one  of  his  Lay  Sermons,  ex- 
presses a  preference  for  justification  by  verifica- 
tion over  justification  by  faith.  The  inference 
which  one  would  naturally  draw  from  this  ex- 
pression is  that  the  sort  of  justification  which 
Mr.  Huxley  prefers  is,  in  the  opinion  of  a  rep- 
resentative of  science,  a  real,  scientific  justifica- 
tion, while  the  other  is  unsubstantial,  imagi- 
nary,—  in  a  woi'd,  unscientific.  Now,  to  brand 
an  opinion  or  process  as  unscientific  is,  in  these 
days,  in  the  opinion  of  very  many  people,  to  put 
upon  it  the  seal  of  condemnation  and  annul- 
ment.    It  may,  accordingly,  be   well  to  give  a 


SALVATION.  69 

little  space  in  this  monograph  on  Salvation  to 
the  inquiry  whether  or  no  there  is,  after  all, 
an  irreconcilable  difference  between  these  two 
ways  of  attaining  righteousness,  and  whether 
Mr.  Huxley's  placing  of  them  in  so  sharp  a  con- 
trast is  not  due  to  his  misapprehension  of  the  real 
nature  of  the  latter.  As  to  verification,  no  one 
knows  better  than  they  who  are  greatlj'  occu- 
pied with  it  that  far  from  being  in  any  way  op- 
posed to  faith,  it  is  so  much  dependent  thereon 
that  without  it  it  cannot  proceed  at  all.  Every 
process  of  the  kind  depends  upon  putting  trust 
in  certain  ultimate  principles  which,  if  not  in- 
tuitively discerned  and  hence  requiring  faith 
in  the  immediate  declarations  of  the  human 
consciousness,  are  the  products  of  human  ex- 
perience through  many  ages,  and  as  such  call 
for  belief  in  the  integrity  of  the  nature  of  man. 
That  much  depends,  too,  in  the  construction  of 
any  science,  on  the  trustworthiness  of  human  tes- 
timony, every  scientific  investigator  will  concede. 
All  the  great  sciences  are  the  accumulations 
of  the  contributions  of  observers  and  students 
often  unknown  to  one  another  and  separated 
by  great  intervals  of  time  or  space.  How 
much  depends,  likewise,  on  the  sureness  of  an 


TO  SALVATION. 

eye  or  a  hand,  the  accuracy  of  perception,  the 
correctness  of  inference,  and  the  freedom  from 
bias  in  the  observer,  is  very  apparent.  The 
great  authorities  in  science,  men  of  creative 
power,  whose  genius  marks  epochs  in  knowl- 
edge, are  objects  of  faith,  one  might  almost 
say  of  worship,  to  their  followers.  What  yawn- 
ing chasms  would  open  in  the  continuity  of 
science  if  one  could  no  longer  have  faith  in  the 
sure  insight  and  conscientious  accuracy  of  a 
Newton  or  a  Darwin!  A  lapse  of  faith  in  its 
conspicuous  authorities  would  work  such  con- 
fusion and  catastrophe  in  the  world  of  science 
as  doubt  of  the  integrity  and  truth  of  Jesus 
would  cause  in  the  Christian  Church.  More- 
over, faith  as  a  factor  in  scientific  verification 
has  yet  another  application.  Will  any  one 
deny  that  faith  in  a  great  master  in  science,  in 
the  sense  of  a  trustful  appropriation  to  one's 
self  of  his  spirit,  his  enthusiasm,  his  devout 
consecration  to  truth,  and  his  sympathy  with 
Nature,  —  in  a  word,  a  fellowship  of  life  with 
him,  —  might  be  vastly  helpful  to  a  disciple? 
If,  now,  verification  is  not  carried  on  without 
faith,  or  at  least  if  faith  is  a  very  important 
factor  in  it,  it  would  appear  to  follow  that  the 


SALVATION.  i  1 

justification  by  verification  which  Mr.  Huxley 
advocates  is  also  not  without  relation  to  faith. 
He  who  should  undertake  to  acquire  righteous- 
ness by  verification,  that  is,  by  scientifically  or 
experimentally     establishing    the    ethical    and 
spiritual  principles    on   which   it    rests,   would 
evidently  be  greatly  aided  by  faith,  and  in  par- 
ticular by  that  application   of   it  in   which   he 
might  adopt  as  his  own  the  virtues,  the  spirit, 
and  the  enthusiasm  whereby  a  great  Master  of 
Righteousness   had  triumphed.     On   the  other 
hand,  the  justification  by  faith,  which   modern 
science  regards  as  unreal  and  sentimental,  will 
be  found,   when   stripped  of   the   magic  which 
has  so  long  disguised  it,  to  proceed  quite  in  the 
manner  of  verification,  and  to  be  in  fact  a  sort 
of  righteousness  according  to  science.     For  to 
live  conformably  to  verified  principles,  whether 
in  the  sphere  of  the  physical  life  or  of  the  soul, 
is  to  live  scientifically.      Whoever,  then,  pur- 
sues righteousness,  trusting  in  a  great  moral  and 
spiritual  order,   which   experience   has  verified 
as  the  true  order  for  human  beings,  and  con- 
formity to  which  has  been  found  for  many  ages 
to  render  the  lives  of  men  strong,  sweet,  and 
noble,  is,  though  not  far  from  the  kingdom  of 


72  SALVATION. 

Heaven,  still  within  the  realm  and  method  of 
science.  And  it  is,  surely,  no  unscientific  pro- 
ceeding to  take,  as  Paul  did,  a  great  principle 
illustrated  in  a  great  life  as  the  basis  for  a  phi- 
losophy of  living,  and  to  carry  out  the  pursuit 
of  righteousness  in  conformity  with  it.  The 
dash  of  mysticism  in  his  idea  of  identification 
with  Christ  in  his  death  does  not  invalidate  his 
essentially  scientific  position,  which  is  that  a 
mode  of  life  which  has  been  verified  and  shown 
to  be  of  the  noblest  sort  is,  therefore,  to  be  com- 
mended and  trustingly  adopted.  Even  as  to 
this  matter  of  dying,  which  Paul  puts  in  a 
mystical  way,  —  is  it  not,  after  all,  in  the  highest 
sense  scientific,  that  is,  verifiable,  that  he  who 
will  live  to  the  higher  things  must  die  to  the 
lower  ?  One  would  scarcely  presume  to  say 
that  Jesus  was  dealing  with  an  unrealitj^  an 
image  of  the  fancy,  and  not  rather  with  a  most 
substantial,  not  to  say  awful  fact,  when  he  as- 
serted that  he  who  would  save  his  life  must  lose 
it.  Do  not  even  the  scientists  the  same, —  that 
is,  die  to  indolence,  prejudice,  and  the  senses, 
that  they  may  live  to  the  truth,  to  reason,  to 
discovery  ?  No  one,  assuredly,  will  charge  the 
great  Goethe  with  being  unscientific,  and  it  is 


SALVATION.  73 

lie  whom  Mr.  Arnold  regards  as  "  an  unsus- 
pected witness  to  the  psychological  and  sci- 
entific profoundness  of  Paul's  concej3tion  of 
life  and  death."  ^  "  Die  and  le-exist !  "  he  says  ; 
"for  so  long  as  this  is  not  accomplished,  thou 
art  but  a  troubled  guest  upon  an  earth  of 
gloom." 

It  may  very  well  be  imagined,  however,  that 
Mr.  Huxley  would  say  that  Paul  did  not  con- 
fine himself  to  the  sphere  of  the  verifiable,  but 
included  God  in  his  scheme,  teaching  that  sal- 
vation is  by  His  grace  in  Christ.  Now,  from  the 
point  of  view  of  science,  God  is  not  verifiable, 
and  the  grace  of  God  is  a  fiction  with  which  it 
can  have  nothing  to  do.  But  the  scientific 
character  of  Paul's  method  of  justification  by 
faith  is  not  affected  by  his  conception  of  a  Being 
from  whom,  as  he  assumed,  proceeded  the  order 
of  spiritual  phenomena  and  laws  with  which  he 
was  dealing.  The  relating  of  these  to  an  ulti- 
mate Power  which  he  could  not  explain,  neither 
supports  nor  invalidates  the  interpretation  of 
them  in  relation  to  the  particular  end,  —  righ- 
teousness, or  justification.  Science,  too,  has  its 
ultimate  powers  and  principles,  which  it  does  not 
1  Saiut  Paul  and  Protestantism,  London,  1870,  p.  149. 


74  SALVATION. 

pretend  to  account  for  or  comprehend.  Yet 
its  particular  relatings  of  phenomena  and  induc- 
tions of  laws  proceed  with  as  much  certainty  as 
if  it  had  fathomed  the  unknowable,  or  could 
give  an  account  of  the  nature  of  matter  or  force. 
If  science  were  without  faith  and  righteousness 
without  verification  and  a  scientific  basis,  then 
might  there  be,  indeed,  an  irreconcilable  discord 
between  these  two  most  powerful  and  most 
fruitful  agencies  in  human  development. 

VI.  —  Secular  Salvation. 

It  has  already  been  intimated  in  the  foregoing 
section  that  if  Salvation  were  stripped  of  the 
disguise  of  magic  w^hich  has  been  put  upon  it,  it 
would  be  found  to  have  points  of  relation  with 
science  otherwise  unobserved.  It  may  fairly  be 
presumed,  too,  that  when  thus  revealed  in  its 
real  nature  it  will  be  seen  to  have  more  to  do 
with  this  world,  to  stand  in  more  relations  to 
the  secular  life  of  men,  than  has  commonly  been 
supposed.  From  the  magical  point  of  view  it 
has  generally  been  understood  to  be  a  means  of 
escaping,  or  a  condition  of  having  escaped,  the 
penalties  of  the  violated  law  of  God,  —  safet}^, 
refuge  from  the  storm  of  Divine  wrath  which  it 


SALVATION.  75 

was  supposed  would  especially  break  forth  in  the 
life  to  come.  Thus  the  chief  interest  in  salva- 
tion has  been  centred  in  its  relations  to  that  life, 
and  it  has  been  given  a  predominant  other- 
worldly tone.  Now,  it  has  already  been  pointed 
out  how  much  stress  was  laid,  by  Jesus  on  con- 
duct, and  how  Paul,  notwithstanding  his  vigor- 
ous polemic  against  the  law,  still  attached  the 
greatest  importance  to  righteousness  in  the 
sense  of  the  right  relation  of  man  to  the  Divine 
order,  regardless  of  worlds,  whether  of  this  or 
some  other,  and  of  times  and  eternities.  In 
order,  then,  that  the  pursuit  of  salvation  be  not 
degraded  so  as  to  become  chiefly  an  eager,  self- 
ish seeking  for  a  remote  and  undefined  good, 
and  a  hasty  scramble  for  security  from  some 
other-world  peril,  it  would  seem  that  all  sound 
thinking  and  healthy  feeling  concerning  it  must 
assume  a  decidedly  this-world  tone.  Not  that 
the  life  to  come,  that  destiny,  is  of  no  interest 
and  importance,  but  that  it  is  of  supreme  impor- 
tance to  right  conduct  that  men  lay  slighter 
stress  upon  times  and  places  and  far  more  upon 
moral  and  spiritual  relations,  and  believe  that 
righteousness  .attained  and  held  fast  in  this 
present  life  will  open  to  its  possessor  all  the 


76  SALVATION. 

mansions  of  the  Father's  house.  The  real 
danger  to  which  theology  is  exposed  is  not  that 
of  becoming  too  practical,  but  that  of  being 
turned  into  a  theurg}^  So  soon  as  the  chief 
interest  in  righteousness  is  transferred  from  this 
earthly  theatre  of  man's  struggle  and  tempta- 
tion, and  concentrated  upon  future  security, 
theology  becomes  degraded  to  the  rank  of  a 
system  of  magic,  the  show  of  which  man  may, 
indeed,  be  interested  in  watching,  but  such  a  the- 
ology will  touch  his  life  only  a  little  more  than 
any  common  jugglery.  It  is  not  the  theurgy  of 
the  now  departing  theology  which  has  nurtured 
great  characters,  but  the  practical  morality,  the 
simple  faith  of  Jesus,  and  the  tender  but  ma- 
jestic life  which  the  Gospels  make  known. 

If,  now,  the  conception  of  salvation  ought  to 
be  extended  so  much  as  to  include  the  deliver- 
ance of  man  from  all  that  binds  him  in  the  stress 
and  struggle  of  his  earthly  life,  from  all  that 
hinders  his  attainment  of  righteousness  here, 
then  there  should  be  included  among  its  agen- 
cies many  of  what  may  be  called  the  secular 
factors  or  forces.  If  his  life  does  not  consist  in 
the  abundance  of  the  things  which  he  possesses, 
neither  does  it  consist  in   their  paucity.     Since 


SALVATION.  77 

it  is  his  fortune  to  work  out  liis  own  salvation, 
he  may  well  rejoice  in  having  unlimited  means 
and  agencies  at  his  disposal,  for  it  is  ordained 
that  he  shall  not  do  this  iji  his  closet  nor  in  the 
desert,  but  in  the  midst  of  men.  His  nature  is 
so  complex,  its  several  faculties  are  so  dependent 
on  one  another  in  their  development,  that  a  well- 
ordered  adjustment  and  harmony  of  all  is  essen- 
tial to  the  true  culture  of  ?iiiy.  To  isolate  any 
one  of  his  faculties  in  its  training  is  like  the 
folly  of  applying  special  cultivation  to  one  branch 
of  a  vine  and  leaving  the  stock  in  wildness  and 
weeds.  The  true  salvation  is  that  of  the  entire 
man.  It  is  the  harmony  of  his  whole  nature 
with  the  great  order  of  things  in  which  it  is 
placed.  The  salvation  of  the  "  soul  "  is  a  mis- 
nomer borrowed  from  the  vocabulary  of  magic. 
Let  us  know  henceforth  only  the  salvation  of 
man,  —  a  healthy  soul  in  a  health}^  body.  A 
right  theory  of  salvation  requires  a  sound  an- 
thropology no  less  than  a  sound  theology.  To 
our  peril  do  we  leave  physiology  and  hygiene 
out  of  the  account.  Paul,  with  his  keen  practi- 
cal sense,  saw  the  importance  of  this  physical 
side  of  man  to  a  true  soteriology,  and  did  not 
fail  to  take  the  body  into  his  system  of  righ- 


78  SALVATION. 

teousness.  ''I  so  fight,"  he  says,  "  not  as  one 
striking  the  air,  but  I  beat  down  my  body  and 
bring  it  into  subjection."  ^  To  him,  as  to  every 
right-thinking  person,  the  whole  nature  of  man 
is  sacred,  and  each  part  is  to  be  regarded  with 
awe.  The  body  is  ''  the  temple  of  the  Holy 
Spirit,"  2  —  a  holy  place  for  the  worship  of  the 
soul.  *'  Therefore,"  he  exclaims,  ''  glorify  God 
in  your  body."  By  no  hot-house  methods  with 
a  single  faculty  did  he  look  for  fruitage.  "  Pre- 
sent your  bodies  a  living  sacrifice."  How,  in- 
deed, like  one  vainly  striking  the  air,  does  he 
appear  who  with  eager,  nervous  haste  pursues 
the.  phantom  of  salvation  for  his  "•  soul,"  while 
body,  intellect,  and  moral  facult}^  remain  in  sad 
neglect  as  having  no  share  in  the  Divine  fortune 
of  righteousness.  The  sturdy  Apostle  may  very 
well  have  wrought  out  his  salvation  in  part 
by  beating  down  his  body.  The  problem  may, 
however,  be  approached  from  another  side,  and 
we  may  find  our  secular  salvation  promoted  by 
such  a  training  of  the  body  as  shall  render  it 
the  ready  servitor  of  the  soul  in  its  attainment 
of  the  higher  life,  —  no  longer  a  weight,  but  a 
support. 

1  1  Corinthians  ix  26,  27.  2  ibid.,  vi.  19. 


SALVATION.  79 

The  principle,  then,  of  this  secular  branch 
of  our  theme  is  that  all  the  physical,  intellect- 
ual, and  ethical  forces  which  contribute  to  the 
development  of  human  nature,  to  the  upbuild- 
ing of  man,  should  be  taken  into  account  and 
utilized  in  the  working  out  of  his  salvation, 
and  that  the  conception  of  salvation  should  be 
enlarged  so  as  to  include  all  these.  The  con- 
duct of  education,  the  making  of  laws,  the  es- 
tablishment and  direction  of  institutions,  the 
observance  of  social  amenities  and  courtesies, 
ethical  training,  sanitary  and  hygienic  regula- 
tions, the  momentous  struggle  against  intemper- 
ance, the  striving  for  political  honesty  and 
purity,  the  humane  ministries  of  charity,  aspira- 
tions and  efforts  in  the  interest  of  brotherhood 
and  universal  peace  and  good-will,  — these  and 
their  kindred,  whose  name  is  legion,  should  be 
regarded  and  employed  as  agencies  in  compass- 
ing human  salvation,  —  that  is,  in  making  man 
complete.  The  religion  which  leaves  these  out 
of  account  may,  indeed,  be  a  fine  celestial 
scheme,  but  it  is  not  a  religion  for  men,  and 
will  not  long  endure  upon  the  earth. 


80  SALVATION. 

VII.  —  The  Intelligent,   Emotional   and 
Voluntary  Factors. 

In  the  fourth  Gospel  Jesus  is  reported  to 
have  said,  "  Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the 
truth  shall  make  you  free."  This  recognition 
by  the  highest  authority  of  an  intelhgent  factor 
in  salvation  may  well  claim  our  attention,  more 
especially  since,  in  the  current  expositions  of 
the  doctrine,  it  is  too  much  disregarded.  The 
conception  of  salvation  as  a  growth  proceeding 
according  to  the  laws  of  the  mind  brings  this 
factor  into  prominence,  and  assigns  it  its  true 
value.  Subject  to  these  laws,  the  process  of 
salvation  may  very  well  be  assumed  to  take 
the  natural  order, —  that  is,  the  order  in  which 
knowledge  has  the  precedence.  The  differ- 
ence between  the  product  which  is  called  sal- 
vation and  the  product  which  we  may  name  any 
other  mental  state  does  not  consist  so  much  in 
the  difference  of  its  factors  as  in  that  of  the  sub- 
ject matter.  The  condition  in  question  is  a 
peculiar  state  of  the  will  and  feelings  resulting 
from  the  occupation  of  the  kriowing  faculty, 
or  the  intelligence,  with  a  peculiar  kind  of 
facts,  or  truths.     Salvation   is   the  overcoming 


SALVATION.  81 

of  tendencies,  passions,  influences,  temptations, 
which  are  contrary  to  the  laws  of  the  nature  of 
man,  the  putting  of  one's  self  in  harmony  with 
these  laws,  and  the  persistent,  consecrated  living 
in  accordance  with  them.  It  is  something  more 
than  this.  It  is  conformity  with  this  order  as 
a  Divine  order,  as  proceeding  from  and  imposed 
by  a  Heavenly  Father,  a  striving  for  obedience 
to  and  fellowship  with  Him  in  faith.  Now,  the 
particular  order  of  facts  with  which  the  intelli- 
gence is  occupied  in  the  course  of  this  process 
may  be  generally  characterized  as  moral  and 
spiritual,  —  facts  and  laws  which  relate  to  con- 
duct and  the  religious  life.  A  clear  perception 
and  a  right  knowledge  and  relating  of  these  are 
the  first  and  indispensable  requisite,  without 
which  the  appropriate  feelings  and  volitions  are 
impossible.  With  knowledge,  then,  salvation  evi- 
dently begins.  First  of  all,  man  must  find 
himself,  his  position  and  relations,  in  the  great 
order  of  which  he  is  a  part.  He  must  recog- 
nize himself  as  a  spiritual  and  responsible  be- 
ing, acknowledge  the  Power  above,  and  know 
the  fruitful  words  of  prophet,  seer,  or  Christ. 
Jesus  appears  to  have  laid  so  much  stress 
upon  knowledge  as  to  declare  that  eternal  life 


82  SALVATION. 

consists  in  knowing  God  and  the  Son  whom  He 
has  sent.  This  knowledge  may,  assuredly,  be 
regarded  as  inclusive  enough,  and,  if  had  with 
the  requisite  intensity,  as  likely  to  produce  the 
feelings  and  volitions  appropriate  to  the  state 
of  salvation. 

Important,  however,  as  are  knowledge,  edu- 
cation, and  instruction,  these  are  ineffectual 
without  the  emotional  and  voluntary  factors. 
Know^ledge  is  not  power.  It  is  only  one  of  the 
conditions  of  power.  Neither  is  it  salvation, 
but  merely  a  condition  of  it.  The  beatitude 
is  not  pronounced  on  those  who  know  righ- 
teousness, but  on  those  who  hunger  and  thirst  for 
it.  The  product  of  intelligence,  the  material 
of  knowledge,  is  supplied  in  vain  unless  the 
emotional,  affectional,  and  voluntary  powers  — 
the  great  motive  forces  —  perform  their  part. 
The  prominence  given  to  love  in  the  teachings 
of  Christ  is  not  without  profound  significance, 
—  love  to  God  being  made  of  supreme  moment 
in  religion,  and  love  to  man  in  morality.  We 
have  seen,  too,  how  Paul,  a  profound  psycholo- 
gist as  well  as  theologian,  accentuated  the  emo- 
tional factor  in  connection  with  faith  in  Christ. 
It  is  not  irreverent,  let  us  hope,  and  certainly 


SALVATION.  83 

not  irrelevant,  to  cite  here  the  testimony  of  an 
eminent  scientist  and  philosopher :  "  Already 
we  have  seen  that  the  connection  is  between 
action  and  feeling ;  and  hence  the  corollary 
that  only  by  a  frequent  passing  of  feeling  into 
action  is  the  tendency  to  such  action  strength- 
ened. .  .  .  Not  by  precept,  though  heard  daily  ; 
not  by  example,  unless  it  be  followed  ;  but  only 
by  action,  often  caused  by  the  related  feeling, 
can  a  moral  habit  be  formed."  ^  Well  did  Paul 
feel  the  weakness  of  the  law  against  the  flesh  and 
the  profound  need  of  a  "quickening  spirit"  to 
effect  the  deliverance  of  man  from  bondage  to 
his  lower  nature.  .What  is  it  but  infirmity  of 
will  which  speaks  in  the  pathetic  cry  of  the 
"  wretched  man "  for  rescue  from  "  the  body 
of  this  death  "  ?  So  far  as  education  may  con- 
tribute to  salvation,  it  is  evident  that  it  must 
address  itself  as  well  to  the  emotions  and  the 
will  as  to  the  intelligence.  Each  man's  duty 
to  himself  and  to  those  whom  he  may  influence 
is  to  bring  these  great  motive  forces  as  much  as 
possible  under  influences  and  discipline  favor- 
able to  moral  and  spiritual  development. 

1  Herbert  Spencer,  Study  of  Sociology,  New  York,  1882, 
p.  367. 


84  SALVATION. 

The  freedom  of  the  will  confers  upon  man, 
subject  of  course  to  influences,  the  fearful 
power  of  determining  his  own  destiny.  The 
pathetic  words  of  Jesus,  "  But  ye  w^ould  not," 
are  a  solemn  recognition  of  this  fact.  In  this 
life,  certainly,  and  in  any  life  in  which  man  re- 
tains his  identity,  the  choice  of  good  or  evil  is 
his  and  his  alone.  Salvation  cannot,  assuredly, 
be  forced  upon  him,  neither  can  he  be  kept  in 
a  state  of  sin  and  condemnation  if  he  choose 
it  not.  The  power  of  the  keys  is  in  his  own 
hand.  Himself  may  he  bind  or  loose  ;  for  him- 
self, open  any  door  of  darkness  or  of  light. 
Not  without  some  appearance  of  reason,  ac- 
cordingly, has  doubt  been  thrown  upon  the 
dogmatic  affirmation  of  the  salvation  of  any  or 
of  all.  Good  reasons  there  were,  indeed,  for 
this  doubt,  if  man's  choices  were  alone  to  be 
taken  into  the  account.  But  while  man  is 
free,  he  is  not  abandoned.  The  unrelenting 
powers  of  Truth  and  Light  have  a  hold  upon 
him  and  the  infinite  persuasions  of  Love  forsake 
him  not.  His  deathless  conscience,  with  its 
eternal  protest  and  inexorable  demands,  testifies 
to  the  preponderance  of  good  in  himself.  Not 
only  does    the    Eternal  beset  him   behind  and 


SALVATION.  85 

before  and  lay  His  hand  upon  him,  but  God  is 
immanent  in  man,  and  there  is  hope  of  the 
transformation  of  every  deformed  soul  into  the 
Divine  likeness  so  long  as  God  is. 

VIII.  —  "Probation"  and  Morals. 

The  conclusion  which  must  be  drawn  from 
the  foregoing  section  is  that  salvation  is  sub- 
ject to  the  law  of  cause  and  effect,  —  a  law  of 
which  psychology  as  well  as  physics  has  to  take 
account.  Certain  psychological  conditions  or 
causes,  certain  factors  of  knowledge,  feeling,  and 
will,  are  the  necessary  antecedents  of  the  condi- 
tion called  salvation.  Deliverance  from  sin  im- 
plies a  conviction  of  it ;  a  perception  of  the  law 
of  which  it  is  the  violation  ;  repentance  towards 
God,  the  author  of  the  law ;  a  hunger  and  thirst 
after  righteousness  and  a  resolute  will  to  attain 
it.  When  these  factors  are  operative,  the  state 
of  soul  which  they  condition  invariably  follows, 
unless  counteracting  causes  intervene.  In  the 
absence  of  these  factors  of  life,  other  factors, 
those  of  moral  and  spiritual  death,  are  in  opera- 
tion, bringing  forth  with  fatal  certainty  their 
appropriate  product.  Therefore,  each  succes- 
sive state  of  the   soul,  each  expression   of  its 


86  SALVATION. 

strength  or  weakness,  is  dependent  on,  and  in 
a  sense  determined  by,  antecedent  conditions, 
—  power  begetting  power,  obedience  bringing 
forth  life,  and  disobedience  bringing  forth  death. 
Accordingly,  under  the  operation  of  the  law  of 
causation,  man  is  perpetually  in  a  state  of  pro- 
bation ;  that  is,  his  conduct  to-day  determines 
in  a  measure  the  moral  and  spiritual  conditions 
under  which  to-morrow's  conflict  must  be  en- 
tered upon.  To-day,  yesterday's  defeat  or  vic- 
tory contributes  its  influence  in  depression  and 
despair,  or  in  uplifting  and  hope.  Every  success 
in  the  endless  moral  struggle  makes  subsequent 
success  easier,  and  every  failure  makes  it  more 
difficult.  To  say  this  is  to  affirm  that  character 
is  a  constant  factor  in  spiritual  development; 
that  as  it  is,  namely,  has  been  made  by  antece- 
dent choices,  it  determines  in  a  large  degree 
the  effect  of  influences,  instruction,  circum- 
stances which  may  be  brought  to  bear  upon 
men.  Probation  so  conceived  is  interminable, 
and  of  course  never  comes  to  a  fixed  or  final 
condition.  There«'  is  no  period  in  it  at  which 
action  and  responsibility  cease  and  judgment 
begins.  Judgment  proceeds  hand  in  hand  with 
action,  since  every  deed  is  a  cause  on  which  its 


SALVATION.  87 

effect  or  judgment  follows  under  unchangeable 
law.  There  is,  there  can  be,  no  "  final  judg- 
ment" for  a  soul  to  whose  activity  no  final 
limit  is  set. 

Now,  it  is  evident  that  in  probation  thus  re- 
garded all  the  moral  forces  have  their  due  place 
and  influence.  Character  is  recognized  as  an 
indefeasible  possession,  and  responsibility  con- 
tinues unbroken.  Every  act  of  obedience,  ser- 
vice, fidelity,  or  of  disobedience  and  falsity,  has 
its  legitimate  effect.  All  attainment  of  excel- 
lence is  an  increment  of  the  soul's  moral  stature 
or  strength.  Inexorable  justice  has  its  course, 
no  artificial  scheme  interfering  to  cheat  it  of  its 
claims.  Man  is  lulled  to  no  false  security,  and 
is  not  taught  to  trifle  with  the  law.  God  is  not 
mocked.  The  same  unchangeable  laws  prevail 
so  long  as  the  soul  exists  in  this  life  and  that  to 
come.  The  course  of  character  is  continuous, 
regardless  of  time  and  scene.  All  the  moral  in- 
fluence and  all  the  stimulus  and  support  which 
accrue  from  a  sense  of  the  inviolability  of  the 
moral  order,  from  the  conviction  that  what  is 
gained  belongs  forever  to  him  who  will  hold  it, 
and  what  is  lost  must  be  regained  by  arduous 
struggle,  remain  in  force  unimpaired.      Virtue 


88  SALVATION. 

is  encouraged  by  the  assurance  that  it  belongs 
to  God's  eternal  order,  and  that  all  which  is 
mighty  and  all  which  is  good  in  the  universe 
contends  for  and  with  it.  Vice  is  not  encour- 
aged by  the  fallacious  teaching  that  through  a 
scheme  of  substitution  it  can  evade  the  law,  and 
by  a  tardy  repentance  sustain  a  claim  to  parade 
in  the  garments  of  virtue.  There  is  fixed  no 
period  of  time  at  which  all  that  the  soul  has 
gained  by  fidelity  may  be  lost  by  reason  of  not 
having  fulfilled  certain  conditions,  and  all  that 
it  has  lost  by  infidelity  may  be  gained  by  ful- 
filling them.  If,  now,  in  place  of  a  rational 
probation  of  this  kind,  we  suppose  its  opposite 
to  obtain,  it  is  evident  that  we  renounce  all  the 
chief  aids  to  salvation  which  man's  moral  nature 
supplies.  If  we  say  that  the  law  has  been  satis- 
fied by  an  atonement,  do  we  not  render  nugatory 
the  law,  and  blunt  the  point  and  invalidate  the 
force  of  the  great  Pauline  announcement  of 
tribulation  and  anguish  upon  everj^  soul  whose 
works  are  evil  ?  If  we  declare  that  character  is 
estimated  at  its  ethical  worth  up  to  a  certain 
period,  say  at  death,  or  the  "  final  judgment," 
and  after  that  time  moral  distinctions  are  not 
at  all  taken  into  account,  but  the  soul's  rank  in 


SALVATION.  89 

the  scale  of  spiritual  excellence  is  determined 
by  its  having  accepted  or  rejected  that  atone- 
ment, do  we  not  juggle  with  righteousness  and 
weaken  men's  faith  in  the  reality  of  the  moral 
oi'der  ?  Are  we  not  in  danger  of  confounding 
moral  distinctions  and  subverting  ethics,  if  we 
teach  that  a  man  who  all  his  life  has  neglected 
moral  culture,  has  indeed  been  positively  im- 
moral, may  be  *'  saved  "  at  the  moment  of  death 
by  accepting  the  atonement  and  "  casting  him- 
self on  the  merits  of  Christ "  ?  Let  us  beware  of 
putting  a  premium  on  the  last  chance.  Rather, 
let  us  no  longer  teach  that  there  is  any  last 
chance.  Our  theology  will  be  radically  unsound 
so  long  as  this  word  "  saved  "  is  not  emptied  of 
its  magical  meaning,  is  not  ''depolarized,"  —  so 
long,  in  fact,  as  it  means  anything  to  us  but 
abandonment  of  sin  and  growth  into  a  moral 
and  spiritual  life  according  to  the  psychological 
laws  of  growth. 

But  not  only  is  this  theory  of  probation  im- 
moral, it  may  be  questioned  whether  it  does  not 
run  counter  to  a  right  psychology.  It  rests 
upon  the  presumption  that  immediately  after 
death,  according  to  the  old  theology,  or  after 
the  ''  final  judgment,"  according  to  the  "  new 


90  SALVATION. 

theology,"  man  enters  upon  an  unchangeable 
moral  condition  for  eternity.  Those  who  "  die 
in  sin,"  according  to  one  of  these  theologies, 
those  who  are  '•  finally  impenitent,"  according 
to  the  other,  will  be  forever  excluded  from 
righteousness.  Right  thinking  and  right  living 
are  supposed  to  be  in  some  way  put  out  of  their 
reach.  Now,  in  what  way  this  is  done  or  comes 
about  is  a  matter  of  great  interest  to  psychology 
and  to  ethics  as  well,  as,  indeed,  is  the  question 
whether  or  no  it  can  happen  at  all.  In  the 
first  place  there  appears  to  lurk  a  contradiction 
in  the  terra  "  finally  impenitent,"  afiirmed  of 
beings  having  liberty  of  choice.  Liberty  and  a 
"  final "  condition  are  incompatible,  since  he 
who  can  choose  can  never  get  himself  into  a 
fixed  or  permanent  state,  even  if  he  were  to 
choose  to  do  so.  The  power  of  choice  would 
imply  the  power  to  get  out  of  it.  Final  im- 
penitence is  an  unpsychological  fiction.  But 
the  popular  idea  of  the  punishment  of  sin  is 
that  it  is  brought  about  by  the  direct  inter- 
ference of  the  Deity  ;  and  it  would  accord  with 
this  idea  to  say  that  if  man  cannot  get  himself 
into  this  fixed  condition,  then  God  can  put  him 
into  it.     But  in  taking  from  man  the  power  to 


SALVATION.  91 

choose,  that  is,  to  change  his  moral  condition, 
God  would  deprive  him  of  that  without  which 
he  would  not  be  a  human  being.  "  Petrified 
into  continuity  of  sinfulness,"  God's  noblest 
creation  would  be  discrowned  and  mutilated.^ 
Some  theologians  put  the  close  of  the  period 
of  probation  in  an  alleged  permanency  of  char- 
acter regarded  as  the  natural  consequence,  under 
the  laws  of  the  soul,  of  long  continuance  in  evil 
doing.  A  man,  it  is  said,  may  become  fixed  in 
the  habit  of  sinning,  so  that  he  cannot  do  oth- 
erwise than  sin,  —  that  is,  cannot  choose  virtue. 
But  he  who  cannot  choose  virtue  cannot  choose 
sin.  To  him  who  cayi  do  but  one  thing  there  is 
no  choice  ;  and  where  there  is  no  choice  there 
can  be  no  sin,  since  sin  is  the  choice  of  wrong 
when  right  might  have  been  chosen.  On  this 
theory,  then,  a  man  may  exercise  and  develop 
his  power  to  sin  to  such  a  degree  that  he  is  no 
longer  able  to  sin  at  all !  The  doctrine  leads  to 
an  equal  absurdity  on  the  side  of  virtue.  It  in- 
volves a  contradiction  to  say  that  a  man  may 
become. fixed  in  doing  right  in  the  sense  that  he 
cannot  do  wrong.     For  to  do  right  in  the  ethi- 

^  The  Doctrine  of  Probation  Examined.    By  G.  H.  Emer- 
son, D.D.     Boston,  1883.    p.  159. 


92  SALVATION. 

cal  sense  implies  a  choice  of  right,  and  there  is 
no  choice  of  right  to  him  who  cannot  choose 
wrong,  since  in  a  choice  there  must  be  two  pos- 
sibilities. He,  then,  who  cannot  do  wrong  is 
not  a  moral  being,  and  cannot  do  right.  Ac- 
cordingly, the  phrase  "permanency  of  charac- 
ter "  is  a  contradiction.  A  permanent  character 
would  be  no  character  at  all,  since  character 
involves  freedom  of  choice. 

IX.  —  Universality  of  Salvation. 

Down  to  the  present  time  in  the  history  of 
the  world  salvation  has  been  limited  to  a  small 
number  of  men.  Exactly  what  a  disciple  had 
in  mind  when  he  asked  Jesus  whether  or  no 
there  be  few  that  are  saved,  it  may  be  difficult 
to  determine.  But  the  indirect  answer  of  his 
Master  is  significant,  "  Strive  to  enter  in  at  the 
narrow  door."  Did  he  mean  by  this  answer 
that  it  is  more  important  that  each  one  strive  to 
attain  salvation  than  that  he  know  how  many 
do  really  attain  it  ?  But  do  the  words,  "  Many 
shall  seek  to  enter  in  and  shall  not  be  able," 
cutoff  hope  for  some?  Rather  the  injunction 
to  strive  for  admittance  implies  its  possibility 
for  all,  and  that  the  failure  of  some  is  due  to 


SALVATION.  93 

their  defective  seeking.  That  these  will  never 
rightly  seek  and  find  an  open  door  is  by  no 
means  implied.  If  by  salvation  we  mean  com- 
plete harmony  with  the  universal  moral  and 
spiritual  order,  then  "  the  man  Christ  Jesus  " 
may  well  be  the  only  one  who  has  attained  it. 
But  if  "  the  narrow  door "  admit  those  who 
knock  at  it,  bearing,  indeed,  many  defects,  but 
animated  by  a  master-purpose  to  attain  right- 
eousness, then  may  many  be  regarded  as  having 
entered  in.  But  how  vast  has  ever  been  and 
is  the  number  of  those  who  do  not  care  for 
righteousness,  and  crowd  the  broad  way  so 
patheticall}'  pointed  out  by  Jesus !  That  so 
great  a  multitude  of  men  wander  in  darkness 
with  "  aimless  feet,"  stumbling  into  degrada- 
tion and  bound  in  chains  of  passion,  lust  and 
selfishness ;  that  so  many  dark  places  on  the 
earth  have  not  been  visited  with  the  healing 
ministry  of  truth ;  that  Nature  holds  relentless 
sway,  and  smites  with  merciless  retribution  the 
unhappy  children  of  ignorance  and  sin ;  that 
Cruelty  scourges  the  weak  and  helpless  till 
Pity  weeps  and  turns  her  face  away ;  that  Des- 
potism grinds  its  subjects  into  the  dust,  and 
smothers    thought    and    manhood    in   Siberian 


94  SALVATION. 

mines ;  that  the  bitter  ages  are  so  long  and 
man's  moral  progress  is  so  slow,  —  all  these 
things  reveal  problems  and  mysteries  at  which 
faith  falters  and  reason  is  dumb.  How  far  is 
the  universal  reign  of  the  Kingdom  of  God 
from  its  consummation  !  How  do  the  tears  and 
agony  of  the  Son  of  Man  seem  to  have  been  in 
vain,  and  the  blood  of  martyrs  to  have  been 
poured  out  upon  a  thankless,  fruitless  earth  ! 
Yet  into  the  awful  front  of  this  mystery  Faith 
flings  the  great  declaration  that  "  God  will  have 
all  men  to  be  saved  and  come  to  a  knowledge  of 
the  truth."  Verily,  of  the  times  and  the  seasons 
no  man  knoweth.  This,  however,  we  have 
good  reason  to  believe,  that  whatever  may  be 
God's  time,  and  in  whatever  mystery  His 
method  may  be  hidden.  He  is  the  Universal 
Father,  and  will,  in  His  own  way  and  season, 
seek  His  lost,  benighted  children  until  He  finds 
them.  If  we  are  to  believe  in  Jesus  as  an 
interpreter  of  God's  spirit  and  providence ; 
unless  his  ministry  to  men  was  a  mask  of  love 
and  pity  to  hide  the  face  of  indifference  and 
mock  the  world  with  a  show  of  sympathy ;  if 
he  truly  represented  the  solicitude  of  Heaven  for 
men,  —  then  must  we  believe  that  the  Father's 


SALVATION.  95 

heart  is  ever  warm  towards  the  prodigal,  and 
the  doors  of  His  house  stand  ever  open  to  the 
son  who  returns  in  penitence. 

The  universality  of  salvation  —  the  hope  of 
all  and  the  faith  of  many  —  would  be  a  most 
fitting  consummation  of  a  theistic  government 
of  the  world,  and  is  a  very  natural  conclusion 
from  its  theistic  origin.  The  salvation  of  a 
part  and  the  ruin  of  the  rest  is  a  legitimate 
conclusion  from  Atheism.  If  the  world,  in- 
stead of  being  the  product  of  Wisdom  and 
Love,  be  the  product  of  Chance,  and  have  only 
a  fortuitous  development,  the  wonder  were  that 
not  a  part,  but  the  whole,  of  the  human  race 
should  not  find  its  end  in  darkness.  There 
are  difficulties,  no  doubt,  in  interpreting  the 
order  of  the  world  and  of  human  life  under  the 
category  of  design.  There  are  disorders  and 
discords  where  we  look  for  order  and  har- 
mony, evil  and  weakness  where  we  look  for 
good  and  strength  ;  the  dark  problem  of  hered- 
ity appears  to  indicate  a  design  to  propagate 
infirmity  forever.  But  in  spite  of  the  diffi- 
culties which  the  world  presents  for  a  theistic 
theory,  the  alternative  offered  to  thought  is 
Theism  and  a  beneficent  purpose  sometime  to 


96  SALVATION. 

find  its  consummation  in  universal  good,  or 
Atheism  with  its  corollary  of  infinite  indefinite- 
ness  and  uncertainty.  The  fact  that  we  are 
unable  to  reconcile  the  existing  physical  and 
spiritual  order  with  a  beneficent  purpose  as  we 
understand  it,  furnishes  no  presumption  against 
the  existence  of  such  a  purpose  and  its  un- 
broken operation  before  our  eyes.  No  one 
will  dare  maintain  that  the  malign  purpose  of 
an  unloving  Creator  is  being  fulfilled  in  the 
world  and  in  man.  The  doctrines  of  the 
Fatherhood  of  God  and  the  arbitrary,  endless 
exclusion  of  any  of  His  children  from  light 
and  life  furnish  a  contradiction  which  the 
human  reason  cannot  endure.  The  love  which 
"  springs  eternal  in  the  human  breast "  would 
suffer  endless  unrest  in  view  of  the  hard  se- 
verity of  a  Father  shutting  the  door  of  recon- 
ciliation against  His  penitent  children.  The 
saints  in  light,  if  they  may  be  supposed  to  bear 
harps  and  crowns,  would  cast  harp  and  crown 
at  the  foot  of  the  throne,  and  declare  themselves 
unworthy  to  worship  the  All-Holy,  if  it  be  not 
permitted  them  to  speed  to  the  world  of  pain 
with  ministry  of  pity  and  message  of  peace  and 
pardon.     The  doctrine  which  affirms  the  failure 


SALVATION.  97 

on  the  part  of  God  to  do  all  that  He  is  able  to 
do  consistently  with  the  nature  of  man  to  effect 
the  salvation  of  all,  denies  His  Fatherhood,  and 
sets  Him  before  men  as  a  Being  who  cannot 
inspire  trust,  love,  and  worship  in  the  highest 
meaning  of  these  emotions.  It  is  fatal  to  the 
noblest  and  purest  expression  of  religion. 

But  if  God  fail  not  on  His  part,  may  not  man 
fail  and  miss  of' salvation  ?  This  dangerous  gift 
of  freedom,  may  it  not  prove  the  ruin  of  many  ? 
Man  is  confronted  with  the  conditions  of  salva- 
tion. If  he  do  not  accept  them  ?  We  have 
already  seen  that  God  cannot  do  violence  to 
human  freedom  by  limiting  man's  period  of  pro- 
bation and  preventing  him  from  choosing  salva- 
tion at  any  time  in  the  existence  of  the  soul, 
without  destroying  the  integrity  of  the  soul  it- 
self. He  cannot,  assuredly,  do  a  similar  violence 
in  compelling  man  to  accept  the  conditions  of 
eternal  life.  Indeed,  to  accept  must  be  volun- 
tarily to  take,  freely  to  choose.  Does  the  salva- 
tion of  any  or  of  all  men,  then,  partake  of  the 
uncertainty  which  attaches  to  all  forecast  of  re- 
sults in  which  a  free  will  is  a  factor  ?  From  a 
purely  speculative  point  of  view,  yes.  Leaving 
God  out  of  account,  yes.     But  it  is  not  alto- 


98  SALVATION. 

gether  a  speculative  question,  and  God  may  not 
be  left  out  of  the  account,  will  not  be  left  out. 
Indifferent  and  inactive,  indeed,  He  cannot 
be,  —  the  God  of  Jesus  and  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment, the  Father.  Given  this  premise,  and  as 
has  already  been  pointed  out,  human  reason  can- 
not refuse  the  conclusion  that  the  resources  of 
Divine  .wisdom,  truth,  and  love  will  be  employed 
without  reserve  to  win  men  from  sin.  Un- 
happily weak  is  the  faith  which  admits  the 
doubt  that  these  resources  will  be  effectual  in 
compassing  the  utmost  salvation.  Will  the  Om- 
nipotent, the  All-loving,  fail  in  such  a  task  as 
this  ?  Will  truth  be  forever  ineffectual  against 
error,  light  against  darkness  ?  Will  the  Word 
of  God  fail  in  teaching  and  enlightening  the 
darkened  mind?  Will  the  obdurate,  the  hard- 
hearted, resist  endlessly  the  chastening  of  the 
Divine  love  ?  Are  the  remorse-,  the  scourgings, 
the  darkness,  which  attend  on  disobedience 
without  terrors  and  motives  for  men  ?  Do  not 
the  arid  waste  and  desolation  on  which  the 
prodigal  soul  is  stranded  suggest  the  hospitable 
plenty  of  the  father's  house,  and  bring  the  be- 
wildered son  to  himself?  Shall  the  Son  of  Man, 
who  on  earth  went  about  doing  good,  have  no 


SALVATION.  99 

ministry  of  teaching,  of  healing  and  pity,  wher- 
ever souls  languish  in  sickness  of  sin  ?  Will 
his  great  prophecy  fail  of  fulfilment,  that  if  he 
were  lifted  up  from  the  earth  he  would  draw 
all  men  unto  him? 

Let  us  not  disguise  the  difficulties  which  this 
great  problem  of  the  salvation  of  all  men  has 
presented  and  still  presents  to  many,  in  view  of 
the  power  of  sin  in  human  nature  ;  of  the  awful 
record  of  depravity  and  degradation,  of  cruelty 
and  inhumanity  ;  of  the  persistence  of  evil,  rear- 
ing its  brazen,  indomitable  front  through  all  the 
ages  of  history ;  of  the  lapses  of  virtue  and  the 
sudden  fall  of  souls  long  steadfast  from  summits 
of  light  into  depths  of  darkness  ;  of  the  appar- 
ently ineffectual  struggles  and  hopeless  defeats- 
of  the  powers  of  good  in  their  interminable  con- 
flict with  the  mighty  forces  of  wrong ;  of  the 
slow  progress  and  tardy  triumphs  of  even  the 
good  cause  of  the  Christ,  with  its  great  original 
Example  and  spiritual  Light,  and  its  vast  army 
of  martyrs,  scholars,  heroes,  and  consecrated 
leaders  of  pre-eminent  genius  and  power.  To 
those  whom  this  awful  front  and  unconquered 
presence  of  TTrong  appall,  who  with  faltering 
confidence  in  right  dare  not  afiirm  its  ultimate 


100  SALVATION. 

victory,  there  is  no  greater  word  to  be  spoken 
than  that  of  him  who  in  his  own  person  over- 
came the  world  and  proved  the  possibility  of 
victory  for  all :  "  Have  faith  in  God."  ''  It 
sometimes  puts  a  terrible  strain  upon  our  faith 
in  God's  fatherhood  to  contemplate  the  suffer- 
ings of  which  this  earth  is  so  full ;  to  see  the 
millions  of  men  who  come  into  this  world  only 
to  be  buffeted  by  its  adversities  and  torn  by  its 
severities,  dragged  through  its  hells  and  hurried 
down  to  the  dark  death  of  the  sinfuL  The  only 
thought  which  saves  us  from  crying  out  of  our 
sympathizing  hearts  that  God  has  made  a  fear- 
ful mistake  in  creating  men  is  the  faith,  which 
holds  us  in  spite  of  all  this  misery,  that  God  is 
leading  man  through  the  shadows  to  the  stars, 
that  strife  and  sorrow  are  growing  less,  and 
man  is  being  reclaimed  and  fitted  for  a  true 
sonship."  1 

Mr.  John  Stuart  Mill,  although  inclined  to 
agnosticism,  thought  it  conducive  to  mental  and 
moral  health  to  believe  in  God  and  a  future  life, 
if  one  could  do  so.  Let  the  creed  of  optimism, 
of  the  final  prevalence  of  the  moral  and  spiritual 

1  The  Fatherhood  of  God  (Manuals  of  Faith  and  Duty, 
No.  1).    By  Rev.  J.  Coleman  Adams,  D.D.    p.  88. 


SALVATION.  101 

forces,  be  likewise  commended  to  men.  Hap- 
pily it  may  be  commended  on  abundant  evi- 
dence. As  the  central  thought  and  essential 
spirit  of  Christ ;  as  a  consummation  without 
which  his  revelation  of  the  Father  is  an  enio^ma ; 
as  "  the  one  far-off,  divine  event  "  towards  which 
the  development  of  man,  as  shown  in  history,  ap- 
pears to  be  surely  moving  ;  as  the  only  solution 
of  the  problem  of  evil,  and  the  only  satisfaction 
of  the  unrest  of  the  "  practical  reason  "  of  man 
in  view  of  the  struggles  and  hardships  which 
virtue  undergoes,  —  it  has  adequate  support  for 
a  rational  faith.  It  lies  not  far  from  the  thought 
of  the  philosopher  who  interprets  human  life 
and  history  by  the  principle  of  evolution,  nor 
from  that  of  the  poet  to  whom 

"  Through  the  ages  one  increasing  purpose  runs  ;  " 

for  he  who  through  the  ages  of  the  world's 
history  can  trace  a  Divine  purpose  ever  evoking 
order  and  good,  is  very  near  having  attained  the 
prophetic  vision  and  faith  by  which  such  a  pur- 
pose is  seen  to  run  victorious  through  the  ages 
to  come. 

THE    END. 


Illlllinnrnin^i'  Semmary-Speer  Library 


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